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About Google Book Search Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web at |http: //books .google .com/I THE Wn^U^'^mavffi %ihtux^* XXV. i LONDON : PRINTBD BT LEVBT, ROBSON, AND PRANKLYN, Great New Street, Fetter Lane /V • ./ ^. vO " \ - ■•;• - • ~ ' :^^^ 1*8 INSClMBi^ '" 1. ■' ' » -"V >,,'' BY A VERY GRATEFUL PUPIL>ASr^*' FRIEND. ADVERTISEMENT. Though the narrative contained in this little volume may present but few striking features of novelty to those who are already familiar with the writings of modern travellers in the East, yet, as being the genuine result of the Author's personal observation on the spot, he trusts that his remarks on the scenes which he has visited — scenes so hallowed in the mind of every Chris- tian — will not be altogether devoid of interest to the general reader. The Illustrations dispersed over the work, with a few exceptions (the scenes in the Island of Patmos and the portraits of the Turkish Sultans), have been engraved from the author's own sketches; and the volume is indebted for many additions to its narrative, to Benjamin Clarkson, Esq., who accompanied the author through Egypt and Idumea. Ruerdean, May I2th, 1843. CONTENTS. rjuam Chap. I. Northern Gennany 1 II. Voyage down the Danube 18 III. BosphMnu and Constuitinople 34 IV. The Levant and the Asiatic Islands 5S y. Qoarantine, and its Employments 70 VI. Banks of the Nile 81 VIL Of the Nfle ; of the present state of Egypt, and of its Pasha 105 VIII. Napoleon Buonaparte in Egypt 125 IX. Of Primeval Theology, and the Parallel Testimonies of the Egjrptian Monuments and the Books of Hofy Scrip- ture considered as Sacerdotal Records . .137 X. The Missionary Schools in Cairo 158 XI. Egypt and Jewish Prophecy 171 XII. The Desert 182 XIII. The Caravan Route to Suez 196 XIV. From Sues to Mount Sinai— Arrival at the Convent 214 XV. The Convent of St. Catherine 224 XVI. Of the Route to Akaba. An Arab Fight. A Rainy Night. Parting with our Old Friends; and Bargain with an Arab Chieitain 244 XVII. From Akaba to Petra 257 XVIII. Petra, or Wadi Mousa 268 XIX. Petrar— Third and Fourth Days 284 XX. Of the Prophecies relating to Edom, and their Fulfilment 295 XXI. Petra^A Farewell 309 XXII. From Petra to Jerusalem 319 XXIII. The Wanderings of the Israelites in the Wilderness of Sinai 334 XXIV. Conclusion 350 Appbndix.— A Short History of the Ottoman Empire, translated from the German of J. von Hammer 358 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. VAOS Mount Sinai FtontUpuce Sheick Tomgebel Abouseeton TWe German Professor lecturing 12 Belgrade IS Mosque at Constantinople 34 The Sultan 48 Patmos 53 Grotto at Patmos 64 Jaflb 69 Village on the Rosetta branch of the NUe 81 Cairo 104 Temple of Denderah . 105 Statues of Memnon 124 Mosque of Sultan Hassan 177 Ctaite of the Citadel, and Scene of the Mamlouk Massacre . 180 Sheick Suleiman Menghyn 188 VaUey of Rephidim 232 Encampment in Wadi el- Ain 248 Sheick Hussein ... 252 Kasr* Pharaoun tofaee2W Archway at Petra 276 ElDerr toface2%1 Chamber with fluted pUasten at Petra to face 2i9 PlanofPetra toface29i Bethlehem 832 Mahmoudll 366 CHAPTER I. Yon have asked me a question which it would have been difficult to answer well, even during those times when a voyager's word ran no risk of being questioned, and few had the assurance or knowledge requisite to challenge the truth of a traveller's story. And in itself it is far from being an easy or very practicable task suddenly to gain an insight into the mind and manners of an ancient hereditary race. This sketch, therefore, of the German character that you have begged for, involves a little more Her- culean labour than so ready an Eurystheus as your- self seems to apprehend. Our forefathers had more gentle credulity and patience towards travellers' nar- ratives than we have ; and it is almost deplorable to think how much doubt and incivility the learned remarks of a second Sir John de Maundeville might now meet with. Oui fathers also were fond of their homes, and war and merchandise alone tempted or compelled them to adventure abroad. It is within iJie recollection of mimy persons now alive, that no ordinarily prudent man ever thought of undertaking a journey from the counties up to London, without first making his will. But times and society have changed, 2 A VISIT TO THE EAST. and the human race appears fast becoming a ** float- ing capital" upon the face of the earth. It seems as if the cycle of progressive changes in the constitution of social life were about to complete its first revo- lution, and that mankind having, as poets teach, emerged from a state of erratic and unsettled bar- barism into one of fixed habitations and laws, were now becoming wearied with their long enjoyment of them, and intended to reassume their ancient nomadic condition by once more returning, under the auspices of civilisation, to a state of wandering and locomotion. The prophet Daniel speaks of times to come " when many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased ;" and unques- tionably such times are now approaching. For a traveller, therefore, to speak his mind in such days as these, when so many more persons are competent judges, must be allowed to be a task attended with more personal risk than in the former tarry -at- home times of the world. And it is also remark- able, that although as a people we are undoubtedly fast setting all other nations a notable example of the eligibility of this civilised nomadic state, and are unquestionably the first-fruits of the " many'* of whom it is said that they " shall run to and fro," an Englishman may venture with more safety upon a sketch of the German character than upon that of almost any other people less remote than the Japanese. Is it not wonderful, how little we really know of the genuine life of our Teutonic kinsfolk ; and this too in spite of our kindred, and our pro- pensity to acquire all kinds of knowledge that comes from an acquaintance with other people ? We are far more in love with the sentiments and practices of our Gallic neighbours than of our German brethren ; and we have really very little know- ledge of Germany beyond what a vague horror of CH. I.] NORTHERN GERMANY. 3 their sour-krout, tobacco-smoking, and snuff-taking may supply, together with some uncertain tradi- tionary impressions of their being in the main a heavy drowsy people, speaking a strange grating hoarse dialect. Notwithstanding, then, our really great knowledge of the various families elsewhere dispersed over the globe, we must be allowed to have a very imperfect acquaintance with our kins- folk. But this is not their case with respect to our- selves. On the contrary, an Englishman is to them a never- failing staple of comic exhibition; and perhaps tbere is scarcely a single burgher in any of the little municipalities of the states who does not enjoy his annual or monthly laugh at some choice specimen or other of English eccentricity, — and who can be blind to the fact, that he is very justly entitled to his amusement? For are we not well deserving of their notice for the strange and ex- traordinary features of character which we exhibit amongst them ? Let an Englishman be found where he may, he is sure to be more or less eccentric: he has either a very determined face, a short la- conic manner, a peculiar, decided way of his own, or, in some way or other, different from others, beyond the possibility of a mistake, he is to be known as an Englishman. Now it will be said that a Frenchman is quite as peculiar in his way, for he seems ever to be surrounded by some invi- sible halo of the glory of France ; la belle France being the atmosphere through which he sees, and in which he lives. But an Englishman is essen- tially eccentric ; and perhaps the comparison between them is scarcely admissible, except as regards the constant presence of the strongest possible effluvia of their respective countries. However, nothing of this is at all true of a German. From the prince 4 A VISIT TO THE EAST. down to the simple plain-spoken bourgeois, sitting under the shade of some huge tree in a Lust-garteUf there is one strong pervading universal desire to display an acquaintance with the manners, language, tone of thought, habits, and customs of almost every people on the earth without exception. So that if the two former mentioned people be eminent for a notable nationality of mind, exhibiting itself in every look, thought, and word, the German, whether noble or citizen, is no less decided a cosmopolitan, never so well pleased as when able to transfuse himself into something like the national character of the foreigner with whom he may be for the time con- versing. He will speak French or English in his own family from choice, and will address his brother by the tide of Monsieur ; he will settle very intricate and important questions in French, English, Ameri- can, Russian, or East Indian politics, and decide the future fate of these states, in less than half an hour ; he will pass from China to Peru over a cup of coffee, and display a knowledge of the intervening countries not unworthy a secretary of state. The knowing every thing appears to be the grand social maxim of German life. The genius of their present society is but the growth of this principle. Education, every where cheap, is a matter of state compulsion in Prussia, Saxony, and other states ; and therefore, at a very early period of life, the statistics of the world become known to the population. Indeed, a German newspaper is no bad index of the mind of the people; for, with barely a line of news respecting its own state, it contains the intelligence of the whole world besides ; and this so clearly and accurately classed under the names of the respective countries, that it might more reasonably be taken for a document drawn up for the private use of some great statesman, and CH. I.] NORTHERN GERMANY. 5 meant to play an important part in some moment- ous deliberation, than as a production intended for nothing more than to afford a couple of days' en- tertainment to the citizens of some little town during the time that they sit and smoke after their early dinner. Their poet Goethe has given the true key to the character of the German of this century in his drama of Faust — I allude to Wagner's sentiment, at the end of one of his dialogues with his friend Faust. With ceaseless toil have I pursued my studies : True, 'tis much I kuow — 1 would that I knew every thing.^ The native of northern Germany is positively beset with an oestrum tormenting him to acquirs knowledge ; and as if their principle, acknowledged in practice, viz. — that knowledge elevates and puri- fies the heart, were not enough, even royal edicts supply a fresh impulse : national schools in Prussia and Saxony overflow with proselytes, under the terror and authority of the landrichter, whose civil power compels reluctant parents to make the re- quisite provision of knowledge for their children. I confess it appears to me to be a problem not as yet solved, how long this state -system may be destined to last ; but, judging from the experience of the past, history affords but few, if any, specimens of attempts on the part of the political power to teach mere know^ ledge to the people. State-education as carried into effect in Athens and Sparta appears to have pos- sessed some definite and intelligible end in view ; — in the one state, to draw forth able members of their assembly; in the other, to perpetuate the peculiar character of the Spartan soldiers. But it is difficult to realise the precise and definite object of national * Mit Eifer hab' ich mich der Studien beflissen : Zwar w eif bich viel ; doch mocht' ioh alles wissen. b2 6 A VISIT TO THE EAST. education in Germany, or to know what special character it is intended to mature and develope amongst the people ; therefore, to say the least, the wisdom of an experiment which is proceeding upon so fatally large a scale may be pardonably doubted by those who are at the pains to ask, what definite end, be it good or bad, not to say, what good end, is expected to result from it ? Of course, if there be any notion that the temporal end of increased political strength and national solidification of power will be hereby served, this has nothing in common with a practical training in the faith and practice of the Gospel ; and if it be that the teachers of re- ligion and the state-ministers expect each to reap their own harvest from the same process, the event alone can shew whose anticipations will be most fruitfully realised. Happily for Germany, there is such an inter- minable fund of sound sober sense in their character, that we may hope the (lay is yet far distant when the modern French school of scientific refinement may number very many converts amongst them. Nevertheless, a great revolution has been worked in Germany during the last fifty years. Political changes have come. An increased facility of inter- course by means of the government posts and occa- sional railroads, the spread of schools, the liberty and license of student life, — all seems to betoken a movement of society, and a disturbance of men's minds from the old hereditary ways and simplicity of their forefathers. And many intelligent Germans have themselves acknowledged to me, that their an- cestral character is on the wane, and fast giving way to the universal or cosmopolitan spirit of this cen- tury. Lingering strongholds of the old spirit, never- theless, do remain. And it is no little curious to observe, in the absence of any general rallying point CH. I.] MORTBERN GERMANY. 7 of national feeling, to what extent some few strong local and family attachments are carried. A beg- gar, for instance, will often decline the money of a neighbouring duchy : it would be the sacrifice of the honour due to his Saxon ancestry, were he to admit into his pocket so much as an Austrian kreutzer or a Prussian pfennig. And go into al- most any mixed company of Germans whatever, the conversation, if it turn at all upon internal sub- jects, is certain to touch upon some debatable matter or other, involving the credit of the rival communi- ties, and calling forth all the energies of their re- spective champions. Perhaps no country contains so vast a body of educated and intelligent men; they seem annually and daily to increase ; and their yearly productions in literature and all branches of art are quite asto- nishing in point of number. Indeed, the prolific character of the German press is one of the pheno- mena of this age of the world — and a melancholy one enough, considering the wild, ungoverned, scep- tical spirit which pervades its productions. It may be, that there is something in the cast and element- ary constitution of the German language peculiarly adapting it to the expression of subtle distinctions or abstract notions ; a circumstance which has given to the philosophy in which their learned men take peculiar pride the advantage of being made unin- telligible to ordinary minds. Thus the impenetrable bulwark of a most capacious language nobly defends the adytum of their science from profane and un- initiated intruders, and protects its mysteries firom all except the chosen few who are at the pains so to tutor their minds that at last they come to under- stand ; hence the high repute which a university-life of scientific seclusion bears amongst them. In fact, the philosophy of their universities may be said to 8 A VISIT TO THE EAST. have given birth to a real monastic system pecu- liar to itself, as if even an " enlightened" era were compelled to bear witness, by some little token or outbreak, how indispensable some portion of the monastic principle is to all human societies. The monks of the middle ages formed themselves into societies, for the sake of mutual protection in the practice of austerities, which were little calculated to be much approved of by the world. They set themselves to bear witness against the world by a life of greater seclusion and self-denial than could be maintained beyond the cloister ; and they had, to say the least, a definite and intelligible object in view. But the German professor is a strict recluse in order to attain an object which dies and is buried with him ; he is not the less a monk because he does not wear a cowl, and carry a bunch of keys, and is as little known to the world without, as were any of those laborious convent -scribes, by whose labour we now possess our remains of classic and Christian antiquity. A great philologist, now alive, has been known to say with the utmost satisfaction, *' I have spent thirty years of my life in the study of my own language; and if I am spared to live thirty years more, I shall then hope to understand it." Such application is surely not unworthy the laborious days of the middle ages — would that the task were as praiseworthy! Most commonly, all that is known of the modern recluse is, that he occupied a certain room, was very learned, and died on such a day. If the subject of his solitary studies ever comes to light, it is but to perpetuate in the minds of others the same perplexity which it has already occasioned in his own. This, however, would be harmless enough, were it to proceed no further than the production of in- nocent subtleties, such as multiplied treatises upon CH. I.] NORTHERN OERMANT. 9 logic, and other philosophical labyrinths. For then whatever power of mischief there might lurk within them, it could take effect only where they were un- derstood, — a circumstance sufficient to obviate the danger of any seriously extensive consequences. But unhappily, although the universities bear a curious testimony to the necessity of some monastic system or other, they are far from being exclusively monastic institutions for the cultivation of science. They are the resort of a lawless, independent body of students, who educate themselves by the instrument- ality of their professors, and acknowledge far less law- ful restraint tian robbers. Four faculties — theology, jurisprudence, medicine, and philosophy — ^maintain their respective professors and proselytes ; and within each there is a system of rivalry perpetually at work that is scarcely credible. The professor maintains a crowded audience by his popularity alone; and when this resource fails, his assembly ceases: he has no moral power of control or rebuke whatever, and for the most part knows scarcely so much of his pupils as to be certain that their names are on his list. Now students in philosophy, jurisprudence, and medicine, having a tolerably practical course before them when they enter into life, do either really learn their vocation, or else sink into ob- scurity ; but theology is the refuge city of the very refuse of the whole body. If there is a student whose reckless braggadocio demeanour, stunted cap, and uncommon dress, distinguishes him from others, he is a " student in theology." None so fond of low haunts, immoral songs, beer-drinking, smoking, and brawling, as the student in theology ; and from these elements in due time arises the future pro- fessor, whose usual course is to recommend him- self by some talent or aptitude of speech to the 10 A VIMT TO THE EAST. notice of the government minister. A cautious statesman will be studious to provide proper variety upon so exciting and dangerous a topic as religion. The new professor is therefore chosen expressly for some eminent points of difference in his system of teaching from that of his colleagues ; in short, the object specially sought for, is variety, with a view to practise the student's mind in judging for himself. The professor is selected and appointed, that he may differ from his colleagues ; and unless he does differ, he fails to fulfil the design of his appoint- ment. This, I was told, was highly desirable, in order that the Truth might be finally elicited. But time has been silently progressing; and if the Truth has ever been uppermost, it has certainly come to the surface without having been recog- nised ; as a drowning man now and then comes up, only to sink at last beyond all recovery. But ob- serve how this affects the imperfect form of Church- constitution which still lingers in Protestant Ger- many. The country still maintains something of the ancient ecclesiastical land-division into parishes ; and the little country churches, with their rural population, are full of lingering attachment to their old Church - associations. Now the only ministry they possess are the progeny of these philosophical divinity-schools; their only service is a long dis- course, full perhaps of many undeniable propositions, preceded and followed by a meagre hymn. Jero- boam, it appears, went through some form of priestly ordination, although he chose the lowest of the peo- ple to be priests. But the Protestant preachers have not even a form of ordination ; a royal license empowers them to practise theology, and a patron's presentation opens the way to a cure ; and in this manner they enter upon their task of teaching from CH. I.] NORTHERN GERMANY. 11 the pulpit the same philosophic doctrine, whatever this may be, that they have learned from the pro- fessor whose lectures pleased them the most. The notion of a faith once delivered to the saints, and earnestly to be contended for, is no part of their system; which is really little or nothing more than a periodical task of declamation. And if it be asked to what this sad state of things is originally owing, the answer must needs be, to that stormy period which first introduced the principle of private judgment into faith, and deprived the followers of Martin Luther of the Christian blessing of an apostolic hierarchy. Protestant Germany is, in consequence, now fallen away to a mere battle- place of the wildest theories and most lawless ex- travagances, which make but a flimsy covering for the gulf of infidelity that lies below them. This is a melancholy, but unhappily a true, pic- ture of the spiritual state of Protestant Germany. I went to Berlin with a high idea of German learning; but a short time satisfied me of the entire baseless- ness of their system. Nothing could be so wearisome and fruitless as their incessant arguings and dis- putes ; no two persons were to be found with the same belief, and no two teachers with the same doctrine ; their few churches thinly and miserably attended, and even the scanty liturgy they possess, obliged to be imposed by the military power of the late king ; and yet such is the indelibly devotional turn of the German character, that, with all this disadvantage, they are far from being either a profane or a trifling people. With great and sincere gratitude to the many private friends whose hospitality to an English stranger was certainly but little deserved by any readiness of reciprocity for which his own country- men are noted, I must bring to a conclusion the task you have set me : and now, if you please, we will move a step further eastward, and change tlie scene to the metropolis of a vast heterogeneous empire, whose maxim of life seems to be, " Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." A merry light- hearted hospitable and obliging people the Aus- triaos certainly are ; and surely it is a cruel policy of their subtle statesman, Metteniich, which turra their merry disposition to hia own account, and, in- stead of trusting to their loyalty for the safety of the state, provides a distracting round of enjoyment, by way of anticipating the rise of any political discon- tent that might endanger the dissolution of bis sin- gular dominions. CHAPTER II. You have often accused me ofgiving you a of Bcenery, localities, muBeums, and all other mul- dtudittous matters usually known by the name of UoBt ; you tell me that I pass over every object of note with the most unaccountable neglect. If this, then, be a well-founded charge, I am sure I do not know how you will pass Judgment upon this chap- ter when you come to read it ; for I make bold to profess myself one of those unhappy persons up- on whom this monument and the other ruin, this famous spot or the other famous region, does not make those choice impressions to which the diaries of accomplished tourists seem to bear testimony. The plain truth is now, that we are, as it were, shot through so many local atmospheres, and driven through so many varying historic assodatjons, in a single day by the power of steam, that it re- quires an unusual capacity of digestion to know 14 A VISIT TO THE EAST. what to do with all the mingled feelings that ought to arise in the course of the day upon beholding so many objects. Indeed, a very susceptible and en- lightened tourist is now rather to be pitied ; his sen- sibilities incur serious risk of being strained, espe- cially upon such a voyage as this. The banks of the Danube have so much mysterious connexion with the past, and with the early history of Europe ; there are so many remains of the Romans along the whole course of the stream, in detached colonies of people, who still bear marks of their early origin ; so much to bring to mind the struggles of the first European invaders, — that there is ample food for any imaginative tourist's mind, especially if he be one of those unruffled contemplative men who seem, by their general cast of tranquil loftiness, as if they were seeking a quiescent atmosphere of the past wherein to expatiate. A newly-married English couple, some years ago, did actually float down the whole stream, to the Black Sea, in a small fiat- bottomed boat; and doubtless, in their case, the lambent gliding movement of so mighty and ancient a stream, could not fail irresistibly to fioat the memory of the past before the voyager. But, alas ! that steam and romance should have no congeniality ! how la- mentable, that we should be compelled to purchase our conveniences at the price of our imaginations ! What can be done in the midst of the bustle of an intolerably crowded steamer ? Are the appetites of Austrians and Hungarians, and tlie ceaseless ac- tivity of cooks and waiters, to be suffered to ex- tinguish a fine train of historic contemplations ? or may they not be postponed to a more convenient time ? Perhaps a rainy day and a map, at the jour- ney's end, will suffice to revive them, and a noble brood of enthusiastic reflections find, if not an imme- diate, at least a subsequent existence. CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 15 Nevertheless for my own part, I could never pre- tend to take the same interest which so many appear to do in gathering together, like a Hindoo diamond- seeker, every atom of minute information, — how such a battle was fought at such an hour, with the exact number of killed, wounded and prisoners on each side ; how a given fort was built by such a Count, and the exact way in which he was killed in the siege : for, indeed, the narrations of all historic expounders go very little further ; and only imagine a diary of such contents, swollen full of appropriate stories of murdered barons, imprisoned countesses, battles, sieges, stratagems, and great generals, with no other connexion than tliey might derive from the line of route long ago fixed by the privileged com- pany for the navigation of the Danube. You must prepare, therefore, for an account of my Danube voyage upon quite a different plan ; and therefore to dispose of the scenery, let it suffice to say, that the whole river is tame in the highest de- gree, except in the vicinity of Pesth, which for so large a town, has, on the whole, rather a romantic position; the neighbourhood of Belgrade ; and again in a tract of about forty miles in length, which lies between Glenkova and Skela Cladowa, where the rocks are truly noble and commanding, and where nature's adorning hand has received no officious assistance from the labours of man, but has been allowed an unmolested distribution of her own orna- ments of variegated brushwood. It is a branch of the great Carpathian range, across which the stream here forces itself; and owing to the turns of the river, we were once or twice agreeably surprised by apparently finding ourselves within a lake, the rocks seeming as if they would close us in. But^ you know, I make no pretensions to speak of scenery. 16 A VISIT TO THE EAST. which is about as unintelligible in a description as fine sentiments in a strange language. We have one curious record belonging to times anterior to the art of writing, and before descriptive language had gained any great general repute, con- taining the sentiments and observations of a well- known wanderer, and keen observer of mankind — Ulysses. Now we shall look in vain for even a glimmer of thought in any of his sayings at all ap- proximating to the affected enthusiasm of our modem tourists and their note-books. That ancient travel- ler's narrative exhibits nature's outward aspect and ornaments in simple and pleasing connexion with the manners, laws, wants, customs, and habits of the people amongst whom he came ; his very language bespeaks a genuine and sincere interest in the con- dition he is describing ; and the feeling, ''I am a man ; nothing belonging to man is alien to me '' {homo sum, nihil humani a me alienum putd)^ breathes so naturally from his story, as to leave the reader spell-bound, and yet unconscious of the charm that has worked upon him; pardon therefore an ad- mirer of Ulysses, if he abstains from the current grandiloquence of these latter days, and proceeds with his story. The first day's voyage to Pesth began to bring our harlequin assemblage, collected as it was from so many different quarters and nooks of mankind, into a little more freedom and familiarity ; those who were to become companions for a longer journey down the stream began gradually to discover each other ; and many little politenesses, and well-meant inquiries, began to spring up among the natives of the various nations and regions, through the medium of French, English, German, and other local languages ; all which, as may be easily imagined, soon made the CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 1 7 scene on the deck of the steamer one of great in- terest. In fact, the nearer any passenger-vessel ap- proaches the East, it becomes more and more an epitome of mankind ; for there is hardly a pursuit which "occupies" or "disturbs,'* according as the case may be, the human mind, whose representative and living exhibition may not be found on its deck. There is always more variety and apparent activity on the frontiers, even of a little German principality, than elsewhere ; but journeying eastward is, as it were, preparing to cross the frontiers of the western and eastern world ; and here may be seen, how, owing to the great harmonious order of Providence which rules this very wonderful earth, there is a sameness of spirit animating each member of the various families of mankind ; that each is busy, in the sore travail which God hath given to the sons of men, to exercise them ; that, although individuals do cross and intersect each other's designs, still, there is a most wonderful harmony pervading the whole, through an infinite number of particular dis- orders and interruptions. I confess I have seen nothing hitherto that gives me so distinct a convic- tion of the really miraculous nature of our life on earth, and our own wonderful blindness to it, as the sight of the people on the deck of this steamer. Putting together the gleanings of all nursery tradi- tions of mariners shipwrecked among eastern and western savages ; of arctic expeditions in search of the North Pole ; of exploring enterprises into the sands of Africa, the rivers of North and the moun- tains of South America, and the wild tribes of Asia ; — putting these together, with the additions they may have received in progress of years, and adding to them the intimations of the various families and states of mankind, gleaned from school-boy and col- lege studies in those authors who have left us very c2 18 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ancient records of mankind ; in short, collecting from all the dispersed stores of memory its trea- sured knowledge of the past, here is the whole realised and brought from a mere phantasm of me- mory, to plain real existence. I have only to go on deck, and I see the living reality. It has been latterly attempted, in more than one ingenious way, to discredit the putting into the hands of youth the pagan records of mankind, and much perverse application of good ingenuity and wit has been bestowed upon this endeavour, in which I, for one, have not the least sympathy. Those persons whose anxiety for the young is so tender as this, must consider that mankind are not really what they would soon become, viz. isolated apexes of existence, if they did not possess this knowledge. We have no knowledge whatever given to us, and we are unable to glean even an instinct, however faint, of any individual existence anterior to our own birth ; and our common faith as Christians, while it declares to us our inheritance in another country, which it is our duty to seek, itself connects us with the past by the law of our second birth. We have the Scripture records of mankind, which are records of the past, purposely given to us ; and it would seem, that in slighting the heathen records of mankind, we were wilfully despising a provi- dential gift that ought to be valuable to us, from its affording continual proof of the vagaries and weaknesses of the human creature, when lefb to itself, and from its abounding with so many inti- mations of the lost knowledge of that faith and worship of God, which our Redeemer has restored to us. It is surely of a piece with modem affecta- tion, to raise a prudish outcry against the immo- ralities of pagan deities, as if the pagan records of mankind contained nothing but these. Such a notion CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 19 betrays great ignorance of the whole of pagan lite- rature. It does but contain these among its general records, in which mankind is exhibited precisely as mankind was, and as mankind would have con- tinued but for the great mercies of the Christian redemption. So far, therefore, from joining in any such af- fected squeamishness, my firm opinion is, that the pagan records of mankind are our natural and un- biassed informers in the history and events of the world, and of our own ancestry and predecessors in it. It is a mere piece of modem affected prudery to declaim against the vices therein recorded, as if the daily life of every one of us was not in the very midst of tangible and living vice : and if we are mem- bers of so artificial a companionship whilst we are here, that even our Christian hopes and profession do not rescue us firom the weakness of being sensitive to an imputation of ignorance of the world, I, for one, boldly say, let us obtain it, if we must have it, from the original records in which it has come down to us, wherein vice stands out in its own naked and undis- guised deformities, and rears itself with its own hor- rid disgusting features, and has nothing of the speci- ous mask and smooth deceitful gloss, that has since been so artfully communicated to it. If vice is our enemy, and if we are still madly bent upon knowing him, let us see him as he is, in the open day, and remember our Christian profession, to overcome evil with good ; and this will be found in practice less dangerous than cherishing him under that cun- ning alliance, which he so well understands how to maintain, with religious sentiment and religious pa- rade. But to come back to our steamer, which is my great delight, from the recollection of the many civi- lities I met with. It was really an epitome of man- 20 A VISIT TO THE EAST. kind. For there were Austrians, Hungarians, noble and peasant ; English, French, Transylvanians, Scla- vonians, Servians, Jews, Turks, Wallachians, Bul- garians, and Russians ; civilians, military, ecclesias- tics, merchants, traffickers, farmers, — in short, an epitome of mankind ; and so very harmonious and good-humoured a one, that 1 am sure it would be greatly to our happiness if the whole chapter could but be the same. By and by the few Englishmen who were on board, with that cold and distant polite- ness, if the term may be safely applied, which always distinguishes them, began to discover that they were embarked for the entire voyage to Constan- tinople ; and national distrust seemed to shew some symptoms of an inclination to thaw before the thought of so long a continuance in each other's company. However, Englishmen are so identical in all times and places, that their study may never be injudi- ciously postponed; and your solitary friend who takes this opportunity of strongly recommending you if you ever come abroad, to come as Ulysses, *^ alone," began to wander about and make ac- quaintances among the passengers. Amongst these were several Hungarian counts, who, with their usual extreme hospitality and kindness,* were not long before they proffered the English stranger an in- vitation to accompany them to their paternal man- sions for the interval between the next steamer. The offer was certainly as tempting as it was frank and kind, but unhappily my place was taken, and must have been forfeited, whereupon matters of finance interfered to say no. Several days, however, were spent very agreeably in their company until we finally parted on the Austrian frontier, when the steamer entered the quarantine regions. During all which time they told me many exceedingly curious anecdotes of the country people, and their way of CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 21 life. You know my sentiments pretty well, that I am no convert to the modem notion diat the more enlightened a people become, the greater happiness they possess ; or that education is destined to be the great remedy for all the practical evils of vice and its unhappy consequences. So far from joining in this notion, I profess I do not foresee what else is to come from it, but eventual misery and unbelief; do not, therefore, be surprised at my thinking these people, whom you would suppose to be in the last stage of [darkness and feudal bondage, very happy and contented. I am inclined to see symptoms, wherever I have been hitherto, that happiness and misery are dealt out to mankind with a very differ- ent measure than we enlightened nations are apt so arrogantly to assume. Whatever the better common sense of mankind may judge, we have certainly current both in " your country," in Germany and France, and unquestionably in America, a sort of self-decided dogma, that happiness is the inevitable result of enlightenment, and that the getting rid of all old prejudices is the best and speediest way of ob- taining it ; hence all philanthropy has of late cast itself into one self-adopted channel, of illuminating mankind. I have yet to learn, that mere man can teach man hetter^ though, unquestionably, he can teach him more ; and I avow that, coming from the midst of highly illuminated Germans, it was quite a relief to me to find myself once more among those ancient agricultural relations of man to man, which appeared to be cemented by so much consideration and good- will on the part of the landlord, and, I have no doubt, by corresponding good feelings of grati- tude and regard on die part of his dependents. It was quite delightful to talk and discuss with the owner of the soil the different little plans he had in view for the improvement of his tenantry ; to 22 A VISIT TO THE EAST. hear him lament that the distance of markets, and the means of intercourse, kept his people some- what behind other states in social arts and the com- mon comforts of life ; to listen to his schemes for various little improvements, to anticipate the gra- titude with which such acts of kindness would be received by his tenantry, and the respect they would have for so experienced and kind a counsellor, so real a friend in all their various practical difficulties. Indeed it seemed as if I had come from the very centre of gaudy philanthropy, with its hollow pre- tensions, to some sphere of real tangible Christian charity ; and it made me the more regret my in- ability to accept their kind invitations. I assure you I was quite content that civilised and educated communities should enjoy to the full the undiluted cup of their own enlightened happiness, provided they would kindly acquiesce in allowing others to be happy in their way, and not force enjoyments upon them which they can neither esteem or understand. You may imagine how pleasantly four days passed in this kind of way, bringing many different objects and scenes of interest rapidly before us, each of which drew forth its story and appropriate comment from my companions, who were well acquainted with the history of their country ; and how sorry I was, when one by one they arrived at the different little villages, by the banks of the river, from which they were to travel to their patrimonial abodes. It made me long to go with them, in spite of the strong coun- teracting attraction, in the prospect of the Turkish people, whom we were so soon to see. It is some- times difficult to avoid looking upon mankind as if it were a mere curious spectacle, created with so many varieties of feature, for the amusement and entertainment of the individual ; and such is the passing nature of a traveller's course, that time it- CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 23 self hardly permits to him more than a mere view of an ever-changing, ever-moving scene. I scarcely know therefore, whether the little snatches of friend- linesses which we receive on a journey, from foreign- ers whom we are never to meet again, seeing that short and soon past as they are in reality, they never- theless leave behind impressions that are a constant source of delight, are not in some degree tokens of our having better instincts within us, and some other destiny in store for us, beyond the narrow confines of daily duties and ordinary life. But I am sure any one who will duly consider the nature of our Chris- tian faith, at whose hands we are bid to seek it, and what practical duties they are which the Author of our faith has for the time laid upon us, will have no reason to regret the season of travel that has brought the thought before him. The time now came when the many agreeable dialogues with the members of the various families, in which, as every traveller must have so often experienced, the charm of national contrast has so great a share, were to come to an end ; and one by one they had all landed, afler a very friendly shake of the foreigner's hand, and good wishes for a jour- ney — the motives of which nothing I was able to say could make them fully comprehend ; and thus, by degrees, what had been before a very reputable epitome of mankind, dwindled down to the small party who assembled under the surveillance of several Austrian commissioners of police, to pass from the hitherto salubrious regions of Austria into infected territory, — the passage being through a gate in a loose wooden railing, guarded by some men in a peculiar dress armed with wooden sticks. As we were standing here, waiting the arrival of the captain, a rat ran out of the pest-district, and was killed by one of the party with his stick. Now, 24 A VISIT TO THE EAST. whether the Austrian quarantine laws have any special proviso for the rats that may transgress them I cannot say ; but since a rat may surely con- vey the plague as effectually as a letter, it would be as well if the officers of quarantine had rat-traps set at proper distances, in addition to the border police. At last our passports were examined, and the cap- tain came, a very determined seaman-like Illyrian, and we were soon seated in the flat-bottomed boat in which we were to make the passage of the *' Irongate,** by which name a very ugly-looking rapid is here known. We were a sadly diminished party, consisting of a Jewish agent, a few Turks, a merchant or two, some natives, and a select band of grave Englishmen, whose principal consolation seemed to be, that they should not now be so crowded as they had been hitherto. The descent was really not unamusing, although I more than once looked at the whirls and eddies of the water with a sort of feeling, that it was quite as well that we had passed them safely ; and thus we came to our new steamer, at Skela Cladova, on the Servian bank of the river. The Galatea, on board of which we now found ourselves, commanded by M. Dobroscovitch, a very intelligent Illyrian, gave our party more room to dispose of themselves and their effects, and also of their thoughts. We soon weighed anchor, and con- tinued our course between low banks the whole of the day, with little else to observe except, on the Servian side, poor hamlets, constructed chiefly of reeds, and on the other bank occasional posts of the Russian quarantine. Our late steamer had borne the name of " Zrinyi"— an Hungarian champion, whose history I had now leisure to search out; and, as a curious specimen from the savage wars of the Turks and Christians, it is here subjoined. CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 25 Towards the end of the reign of Suleiman the Great, when the Osmanli arms had subdued Bagdad, the remotest point of their Eastern empire, a lame force under the grand vizier, Mohammed SokolTi, was detained before the insignificant fort of Szigeth, defended by the Castellan Zrinyi. The place is now in a ruinous state, consisting of the old and new town, united to each other by a bridge, together with some few remains of the old castle, about ten miles distant from the Hungarian town of Fiinf kirchen. Two fruitless attempts were made to take it by storm, and at last, by the springing of a mine, the outer defences were completely laid bare. The same night Sultan Suleiman diedf having a short time before impatiently written to his grand vizier, to inquire why diis puff of smoke had not yet done burning and the trumpet of victory sounded. The crafty statesman, finding the sultan dead, is said to have secured the secrecy of his death by strangling the physician ; and continuing to issue orders in his master's name, the siege of Szigeth was pressed with greater fury than ever. In this distress, Zrinyi resolved at least to die the death of a Christian knight; therefore, calling for his chamberlain, he bid him choose a hundred Hungarian ducats from his treasure, and sew them into a silk waistcoat, taking care that there was not a single Turkish one among them ; ** For," said he, " it is but right that he who strips me should find something for his pains ;*' then calling for the keys of the castle, he placed them with the coins, adcHng, *^ So long as I can move my hands, no one shall take either the gold or the keys firom me." Then selecting the oldest of three swords, which were inlaid with gold, " With this," said he, " I first obtained my honour- able name, and with it I am ready to receive the fate that it shall please God to keep in store for me." D 26 A VISIT TO THE EAST. With six hundred followers, to whom he ad- dressed a few short words, concluding them by calling three several times upon the name of Jesus, he marched out to attack the Turks. It was a critical moment. A large body of the enemy were forcing their passage over the bridge, when Zrinyi commanded a huge mortar, loaded with fragments of iron, to be fired off, which brought down nearly 600 of the assailants. Zrinyi, accompanied by his faithful standard-bearer, now boldly rushed upon the dismayed Janissaries, and was struck down on the spot by two bullet-wounds in the breast. He was seized by the Janissaries, and before life was quite extinct, beheaded upon one of the cannons. In the meantime the little fortress had become the scene of murder and burning ; the streets were heaped with the dead bodies of women and children. Zrinyi*s chamberlain was taken prisoner, the half of his beard shaved off in derision, and as he was being questioned in the presence of the grand vizier concerning Zrinyi's treasure, a page, a young Hun- garian, full of spirit, replied, " Zrinyi, before his death, had destroyed all that he was able, so diat the value of 5000 ducats scarce remained; and, moreover," added he, significantly, ** while we are speaking, the same fire, without the help of which you would never have taken the fort, will prove the destruction of your own force." The grand vizier, alarmed, gave immediate command to withdraw the troops ; but before any of the plunderers could be warned, the whole fortress was blown up into the air, and more than three thousand of the Janissaries perished in the ruins. The same day the grand vizier, Sokolli, sent the head of Zrinyi, together with his silken robe and golden chain, to the governor of Ofen, with the command to forward it to the emperor's camp. In CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 27 later times these remains were removed to Ischaka- tfaurm, and laid by the side of his first wife in the abbey of St. Helena.^ The evening of this day brought us to the first Turkish town we had as yet seen. Our cabin- party was now exclusively English, and we were all equally unprepared for what was to come. We had observed many significant symptoms of our approach to a region of turbans, and somewhat of our pre- existing notions of the East seemed to be realising themselves in the peculiar gravity as well as in the eastern dress of the sailors of the little craft that were here and there working their way slowly against the current ; when our captain proclaimed to us that we were coming near to Widdin, but that he feared it would be too late to take us to smoke a pipe with the pasha. I believe none of the party will forget, as long as they live, the strange sight that presented itself upon first passing the gate of the town. We had no great distance to walk along the dark mud of the river-side, from the spot where the steamer's boat put us ashore, to the broken archway by which egress and ingress was obtained into the pasha's metropolis, and yet even these few yards were sufficient to surprise us by the unusual number of sickly tawny-coloured dogs, all of whom appeared to nestle with a peculiar relish in the dirt and refuse that lay beside the walls. We have since been too much accustomed to the sight of these dogs to be any longer surprised ; in fact, so universal are they, that they would seem to be a second subordinate population in the East. We walked into the town * See J. Von Hammer's ^'Geschichte der Osmanlf ^8 A VISIT TO THE EAST. with an intense curiosity. Its appearance from the river had been very pleasing. The green foliage of the several trees surrounding the mosques, their tall taper minarets, gleaming white in an almost- setting sun, and pointing towards heaven with a kind of eastern solemnity and emblematic meaning, all seemed to bespeak the presence of that widely spread religion, in which it pleases the- Creator to permit His name to be adored, and that we were now really among the people and manners of the East. It was very nearly sunset when we entered, and we were therefore not without apprehension of being locked in, by the closing of the gates ; for when the Mussulman once closes the gates of his town at sunset, neither the Faithful or the Frank are suf- fered to go out without the most laborious inter- cessions with the chief governor of the town. The interior surpasses description ; there were stragglers in the streets, with red turbans, and long pipes in their hands, and the streets themselves were narrow and dirty. The different shopkeepers in the bazaar were locking up their warehouses, and we were puzzled to comprehend what kind of sales could be effected in them, for they seemed to us rather cup- boards than shops. However, we were compelled to walk on in a great hurry, for fear of the gates, to the considerable surprise of those who saw us, though they hardly exhibited their wonder to the same extent which a Turkish dress would have called forth in an Elnglish town ; the children in the streets did not run after us. At last we were for- tunate enough to find a gate at the opposite end of the town, and were very glad to escape by it, having been distinctly conscious that we had passed through a strange dirty place, and had seen a curious and singularly dressed population. On the CH. II*] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 29 whole, forming a very odd and strange impression, for our first one, of Turkish manners and Mussul- man ways of life. Little else of much interest happened until we came to Galatz, where we were to remove from the care of our hospitahle captain into the hands of a little officious Englishman, the commander of a larger steamer, entitled the Ferdinand. We happened here to fall into company with a somewhat notorious character, who was returning from a tour of nearly three years' duration in the Levant, — Prince Piickler Myskau, — a man who has obtained a certain kind of celebrity in Germany for the strong caustic hu- mour and pointed satire of his writings. I think there could be little doubt of the opinion we soon unanimously formed of him, — a man destitute of re- ligion, and even truth — one of those many melan- choly instances of the human mind returning only the more hardened and confirmed in its unbelief, from a view of the very countries and scenery which have been the more immediate witnesses of the Al- mighty's dealings with mankind. It is one of the practical lessons which experience teaches the tra- veller, that different minds are in different degrees alive to the evidences of the providence and dealing of God with men ; to him, therefore, it is less a matter of astonishment than to other men how Pha- raoh could have exhibited such deep blindness to the power of God, notwithstanding that it was proved to him by so many wonderful and severe punish- ments. Our illustrious visitor had returned from the midst of even stronger evidences of God than were shewn to Pharaoh, an infidel, an unblushing open infidel. Among other passengers with whom the deck of the steamer began now to be crowded, after we had parted with the prince, were a company of Jews, d2 80 A VISIT TO THE EAST. chiefly from the north of Gallicia, the Austrian divi- sion of Poland, on their way to the Holy Land with their wives and families. They were nearly eighty in number, occupying together with their household stuff, almost the whole fore part of the deck, which exhibited much the same marks of misery and dirt as themselves. We were compelled to wait a day, in order to take in coals, during which time we amused ourselves in the best way we could by watching the different passengers come on board. At last, to our unanimous delight, the signal was given to weigh anchor, and once more we foi|nd ourselves advancing, between the low sedgy banks of the river, towards the Black Sea, our steamer presenting us again somewhat of an epitome, though a different one, of the world. There was something, from the first, peculiarly striking in the appearance of many of the older Jews who were now on board. Wretchedly squalid, and even filthy, as they were, their long coloured outer gowns ragged and torn, many of them, nevertheless, as they occasionally stood on the bare deck of the steamer, with their long silvery beards, and their heads uncovered, reciting parts of the Hebrew Scriptures, might have been taken for some of their own pro- phets whom their fathers had slain. There is certain- ly this wonderfiil peculiarity about the descendant of Isaac, that his face, eye, and features, proclaim him a Jew, no matter under what zone, or among what people he be born : he is found speaking every lan- guage of the earth, and &miliar with the customs of every people under the sun, and yet still he has his own language, his own Scriptures, his own ha- bits ; and his heart is away from the land of his captivity in the home of his fathers. Even in the midst of all the abject degradation, servile cor- ruption, dirt, misery, and filth, which distinguishes CH. II.] YOTAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 31 almost every European settlement of this people, there seems still, when one comes to observe their instinctive reverence for the word of God, which they still possess in their Scriptures, as if there were seeds of latent dignity among them, that were but slumbering until it should please their great Pro« tector, the God of their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to take them again to himself. I remember a friend at Berlin, Professor Hensel, the Hofmaler or court painter, shewing me several studies of the heads of Polish Jews, which he after- wards introduced into his great picture in the Dom^ kirche of Berlin. Upon one occasion, he brought a venerable rabbi into his atilier ; and happening to inform him that he thought he should make use of his portrait, I think, for the design of Moses receiv- ing the tablets of stone on Mount Sinai, the spirit of the ancient Israelite was so touched at the men- tion of this passage from the former history of his nation, that the professor was enabled, with hardly any subsequent alteration of the sketch, to finish what is considered very generally the most success- ful of his pictures. Wherever a Jew is found in Poland or Russia, or indeed in any country where they have kept themselves tolerably distinct firom other people, if he be on a journey in the midst of the most motley assembly, he never omits, morning and evening, to retire into a comer to say his prayers, which are usually repeated in a very audible tone. Though the company jeer and mock at him, he steadily proceeds, and bestows not the least notice upon them until he has completed his duty. If he be of some little rank, he produces his muslin veil with its deep blue border, and, binding his phylactery upon his fore- head, he performs his devotions, utterly unconscious of the remarks passed upon him. Those who were 32 A VISIT TO THE EAST. now on board seemed in the same manner to pass almost the whole day in reading or chanting parts of the Psalms and the Prophets, mixed with portions from the works of rabbinical authors, some of which were in manuscript, but for the most part in a kind of quarto-sized print, of either Amsterdam or Vene- tian type. At different times of the day the seniors would assemble together, and, wearing their veils and phylacteries, commence a kind of wailing chant, not altogether unpleasant to listen to ; but throughout the whole day it was scarcely possible to fix upon a time during which some one of their company would not be studying either his Bible or his commentary. I used now and then to go among them and endea- vour to speak to them, and uniformly found the readiest disposition, both to converse of their con- dition at home, their faith, and their prospects in Palestine, where they were going, with a full con- fidence and trust, I must do them the justice to say, in the power and mercy of the Almighty towards them, that is very rarely to be found in a Christian. The great difficulty of understanding the broken German which they spoke, with their singular pro- nunciation, was a drawback upon these dialogues, from which a large fimd of very useful information might, I am convinced, have been gleaned, relative to their habits and tone of thought ; and I am now sorry I did not make better use of the favourable occasion ; but the exceeding dirt of their own per- sons, and of all their possessions, was such as to make a European really afraid to go amongst them. We soon passed the Russian forts at the open- ing of the chief of the seven mouths of this great river, which the known diplomatic cunning of that power has had the address to secure for itself by one of the late treaties, and came into the Black Sea — really " black sea;" for though not sufficiently CH. II.] VOYAGE DOWN THE DANUBE. 3$ black to change a man into an Ethiopian, if he were to bathe in it, or to serve as ink, it possesses a vi- sible and distinct black hue above all other seas. We continued more than a day on the passage, with an occasional glimpse of the low coast, till we touched at Varna, the scene of a great Russian and Turkish campaign, where we landed, and paid a visit to the pasha, previous to embarking for the great river, as the Bosphorus is here termed, dividing the eastern and western worlds. CHAPTER III. It will often, T am sure, occur to you, if you ever come abroad, as something surpassingly wonderful, that tliere should exist so many disdoct orders of legends respeciing particular spots of the earth. The Turks, for instance, inherit a legend, that the time will come when they will be compelled to de- sert their European territory and retire to Asia; and, in consequence of this belief, their favourite cemetery is at Scutari, on the Asiatic coast. The Mahometans of Jerusalem, and elsewhere, almost universally hold the traditionary belief, that from a certain stone in the eastern wall of the Temple CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 35 of Solomon, now the Mosque of Omar, the dead will be judged at the last resurrection. The dif- ferent savage tribes of North America preserve the traditions, of their tombs, and of the scenes of cer- tain great victories of the heroes and sages of their race. Even the modem Egyptian looks with a kind of awe and bewilderment upon the strange memorials of his ancestors ; and the Romaic Greek, in the now European kingdom of Greece, surveys with a kind of filial interest, not unmixed witli wonder, the stately though naked columns of Ju- piter Olympius, or the still grander and more deso- late ruin which yet remains on the crown of the Athenian Acropolis; his simple exclamation, '£X- Xi^viica ra irpay^ara, carries both his own thoughts and those of his hearer back to different times, while before them are the visible witnesses of those times, in which the handiwork of man tells a tale that cannot be forgotten, of former men, their works, and their times. The Bedouin Arab marks out certain spots on the desert, distinguished by a few stones, and perhaps a circular mound of loose gravel, on which grows a withered scanty herbage. It is the burying-place of his forefathers, who are collected round the last resting-place of some one of the tribe more famed than die rest for his self- denials and strictness of life. And he will be seen to steal from the caravan as it passes, to spend many moments in prayer for his own soul over these remains of his ancestors. The mounds of the dead still remain as they were left on the plains of Ma« rathon ; and the stranger, but especially the Greek, who sees them, is compelled to recal to his mind the &vlpaQ Mapa^wyofiaxovc his ancestors who fought and died there. When the traveller sees the females of an eastern town seated, in their white veils and simple costume, in the midst of the tombs 36 A VISIT TO THE BAST. and marble monuments of the dead, he has before him an instance of the weakness of human nature, as it were clinging to the generation that has pre- ceded it, and acfaiowledging, by the instincts of its own nature and existence, that the cessation of this feverish life is but a removal to another scene that the eye cannot see, the heart cannot conceive, and faith itself but weakly and transiently apprehend. If the Christian, passing by on his journey, should meet with the broken fragments of the once nume- rous churches that have now seen their seed time, and have yielded up their harvest to the last and final day, and should find involuntary sorrow op- pressing him on the reflection, that it has pleased the Lord of his Church, to cause the stream of his faith to wander into other lands, and leave its birth- place a prey to the contending Estctions which now wield his heavenly doctrine for earthly aims, — what has he again here but a proof how instinctively we cling to the human race that has gone before us 2 The past seems as if it seized the human soul in its talons. And they are some of the deepest and tenderest instincts of our nature, which forbid us ever to cast off the holy and sacred union that binds us to our forefathers. It is this sacred bond and invisible connexion with our predecessors, which under Providence has continued among all tribes and kingdoms of men, to preserve the authority necessary for the community in the hands of such as were rendered the fittest stewards of it, by their consciousness that they belonged to a race of fore- fathers. It is certainly a truly mean and degrad- ing spirit which aims to bring about a forgetful- ness of the respect due to the great and good men, who in past times have played their parts most nobly on this same earth where we now find our- selves. CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 87 Some such train of thought as this, I am per- fectly assured, can never fail to arise naturally to every right-minded man, on his coming in view of any of the regions which are well known in the early legends of mankind ; and they will be found to convey to the heart, rather than the mind, an overwhelming feeling diat life is, afler all, but a passenger-sort of thing, a mere shadow ; and then the simple language of the Psalmist obtains a strange degree of meaning, '* Yea, many a time turned he his anger away, and did not stir up all his wrath, for he remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passeth away, and cometh not again.*' The legends of the past crowd upon the mind, and yet the eye furnishes its own contrast of the present ; what end, therefore, is there to the per- plexity which arises, but the deepening conscious- ness that, little as we are aware of it, we are really in the midst of incomprehensible wonders, and that the very tenure of our life has itself embarked us upon a far more wonderful journey than any upon which we can embark ourselves ? We were entering the Bosphorus about eight o'clock, and it was a lovely morning ; on our left were the rocks, celebrated in ancient story as the Kvdveai crvfnrXriyaltQy that used to nod together on the ap- proach of all ships to their grievous peril; but whose locomotion, like the musical voice of Memnon, seems to have belonged exclusively to other times, for they looked as unconscious of our approach as, perhaps, our Jewish and Turkish fellow-passengers were of our being engaged in talking and thinking about them. icrai h\ OwfTois eis kel \6yos {xiyas T^s ff^s iropflas, B6a"iropos 8* iirditfufios ' ^8ch. Prom. Vinct. JL 58 A VISIT TO THE EAST. {ue, " men shall aye preserve the memory of thy pas- sage, and from this shall the sea be called Bosphorus") — seems almost a prophecy of the ancient poet ; or, at least, a proof of the indelible nature of ancient le- gendary tradition. The rocks were there upon which poets had made fables, but their name and their story had dwindled from the living. Byzantium was still a populous town at the other extremity ; but it had lived to see two of its ancient names swallowed up in a third — Stambul, and one great, almost universal empire give way before another, now in its turn de- clining ; and, notwithstanding, the name Bosphorus remains, according to the ancient legend {eig ael), for ever. We soon collected together on that part of the steamer which is usually sacred to its governing authorities (in plainer language, I believe, generally called the paddle-box), by the special permission of our obliging captain ; and I am not in any degree exaggerating the charms of the scene in saying, that it would be difficult for any human imagination to conceive a view of more pleasing and varied beauty. I make no pretension to be a describer, but there is something in the feeling, that one is, as it were, be- tween the jaws of two rival worlds, shut in between the territories of Shem and Japheth, on the spot where such great events, involving the destinies of so many different families of mankind, have been brought to pass ; and having before the eye the regions of ear- liest fable, and yet a real animate scene teeming with life, marked with a character at once so gay and oriental, that it must needs require a treble por- tion of national phlegmatic apathy not to remember, long and vividly, the first view of the Bosphorus. At Widdin, Routschouk, and Varna, there are, it is true, glimpses of Turkish life; but not until the Bosphorus comes in sight is real Turkish life visible. CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 39 And yet, with all its gay and lively appearance, there rises in the midst of its beauties an odd sense of a mixture of ruin and decay blending with the fresh- looking ornament and busy stirring movements of the whole scene. It seems as if Neglect and Taste were at declared war with each other ; or rather, be- ing at war, had agreed to divide and parcel out their possessions. A light airy handsome house, with its knot of towering cypresses, its neat garden on the hill-side, above and below foliage and verdure of the most luxuriant growth, will often have close be- side it a ruined hovel, its fences overgrown with brambles, trodden under foot, its windows falling out, to all appearance deserted and valueless. Again, which is the peculiar charm of the Bosphorus, its clusters of taper minarets, pointing to heaven from the midst of dense groves of dark foliage, that hardly allow the chief dome of the mosque, and its gilt crescent, to appear, — the whole intimating a deep reverence and solemnity in the Turkish wor- ship of God ; yet, . in the very next spot may be oflen seen the broken wall of some deserted enclo- sure, an idle assemblage of dirty people, as if en- joying the prospect of a time soon to come, when the mosque and its precincts would be in the same condition. If there be any where a venerable ma- jestic old tree adjoining, the scanty grass will be all worn away for some distance around it, by the crowds of idle loiterers, and its aged branches and tattered foliage profaned with dust. But, taking the whole scene together, it is justly to be praised ; the num- ber of light caiques, the various rigs of the little craft, their white sails glistening against the deep blue water, which a fresh breeze deepens to some- thing approaching an Euxine blackness ; the beau- tiful little clusters of houses, gardens, mosques, min- arets, cypress-trees, combined with varieties of rock 40 A VISIT TO THE BAST. and woodland, hill and dale, craggy banks on each side, and deep blue, peaky, distant mountains, — these are some of the first objects which gratify the stran- ger upon his entrance into the gate of the eastern and western worlds. When the noble city herself bursts on the view, occupying the heights of the hill, crowned with her tall minarets, and shining white in the sun, her buildings interspersed with dark fo- liage, — one is almost prepared for an eastern para- dise on landing. But no sooner is the anchor cast, and the steamer swung round to her moorings with the tide, and the light caique has conveyed the pas- senger to the stairs at Galata, the officious servitore of some miserable locanda procured porters for the baggage, and a civil salute been given to the captain, who comes on shore with a dignified attempt at naval uniform, than the charm is gone; you are in the midst of filth and poverty, dirt, wretchedness, and rags ; mixed up, in the true spirit of Oriental con- tradiction, with splendour and dignity scarcely less miserable. The streets are narrow, crowded with an infinite variety of costume, full of holes, filth, water, and mud, badly paved, filled with the nastiest dogs, upon which it is hardly possible to help treading, and if trod upon, then the resentment and bad wishes of the Turks must be encountered ; and, now and then, one dog more savage than the rest will snarl and offer to bite. The houses are low shapeless build- ings, more like barns, garden-tool houses or pig-sties, than the dwellings of man, with wooden blinds like shutters, to prevent a passing infidel from obtaining a glimpse of the ladies within. — It is with such ob- jects as these in sight and smell, that the stranger toils along a rough, rugged pathway, up the steep hill-side of Pera, to his temporary dwelling in a lo- canda ; commanding, perhaps, a distant view of the Asiatic coast, finer and more lovely than any scene CH. in.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 41 in the whole of Europe. It seems, indeed, as if ruin and beauty, taste and decay, had formed the strangest alliance conceivable, not to say subsisting ; and that Turkish magnificence was to prove, on be- ing inspected, little better than frankincense perfume, very pretty and fragrant whilst burning, but nothing more than a discoloured remnant, part ashes, part smoke, when the flame is over. I am, at best, but a miscellaneous narrator ; it is tedious to drag oneself over the dull beaten track of tourist descriptions, and I purpose that you should see the greater part cut short, root and branch. Besides, I am a bird of passage, on my way eastward ; and though I could give you a num- ber of descriptions of this and that object, there is I hope more to come of greater interest ; and perhaps, when all was done, and the narrative perfected, you would say, " This might do for a guide-book T More- over, it is fruitless to attempt a description of an eastern population ; the eyes that have not seen them in reality will never see them as they are through the pages of any book. The art of pen- manship may with all the education of the last twenty years have attained to great things ; when it has compassed this, it will then have some achieve- ment to boast of. But, not to appear, as it were, to tantalise with express malignity, I shall venture upon an extract or two descriptive of our visit to the three principal mosques ; into which a few years ago it was a rare event for any European to enter, though now a common one enough. We had for several days passed by these really beautiful buildings with much longing to see the interior ; the utmost of which we could obtain a glimpse being a few glass lamps con- taining oil with little tapers swimming in them ; a figure or two seated cross-legged upon matting £2 42 A VISIT TO THE EAST. apparently very dean ; but no more. To our great delight, as we were conning over the expenses of a firman, the news spread over the different inns that a firman was granted, and that the mosques would be open some time the next morning. The Aia-Sophia being the principal mosque, we accord- ingly made it our rendezvous at the early hour of six, that we might run not the least risk of being too late ; and were rewarded by the pleasure of studying the habits of the passing and loitering po- pulation for four hours and a half; during which each of us for the first time made trial of the sheesha or water-pipe, and found it a rather cumbrous method of smoking. At last there were symptoms of a bustle, and the party seemed to be busy buying slip- pers. Some acknowledgment of the sanctity of the mosque was most justly required from us, in the manner customary with them, namely the taking off our shoes ; but a Frank dress hardly permitting this, the substitute of covering them with the inner leather slipper was allowed instead. Tins custom of ac- knowledging the house and temple of God by putting off the shoe, is one from very early times. Moses and Joshua were commanded — " Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.'' It is the invariable practice among eastern religions. We entered St. Sophia, and found ourselves within a large spacious dome, from whence were suspended innumerable lights, or rather glasses for oil, not unlike those which are used in Europe for the bed-rooms of invalids and nervous people, as a protection against the terrors of darkness. I cannot give you a full description. I was too much per- plexed by the novelty of the scene. The high altar (the altar where St. Chrysostom once stood) is clean gone; it faced the main entrance from the west. CH. III.] BOSPUORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 43 There is still a small pulpit, to which a straight row of stairs leads, whence an harangue is made every Friday. We wandered about for some time ; but the three French officers, to whom the firman had been granted, apparently anxious to have done with the business, hurried us to the cloisters, as I shall term them, from want of knowing better, up some stone steps, and from thence to the outside, where we were at last able to climb to the top and to enter a little gallery surrounding the interior of the dome, that resembles the whispering-gallery of St. Paul's cathedral in London, and commands an admirable view of all that is going on below. The depredations which travellers and others have here made upon the mosaic work of the ceiling of the dome are but too plain. In some places the mosaic is stripped off for several feet ; and such appears to be the raven- ous collectorship of the Frank visitors, that even the little boys in the streets are assiduously on the watch for their opportunity clandestinely to offer for sale the plunder of this ancient edifice, wrapped up in pieces of paper ; and, now and then, positive frag- ments of the plaster, with the mosaic work imbedded in it. The material consists of square bits of glass with a gold enamel over the surface exposed to view. The roof is so blackened, that it is not pos- sible to see clearly what the design is ; which appears, as far as one can judge, to be that of the dove de- scending. The ground-plan of the church resem- bles a Greek cross. The length of the nave, from east to west, is about 270 feet ; its breadth, 150 ; from the floor to the span of the dome, about 185 feet. There is something remarkable in the extreme flatness of the dome, which has barely more than a concavity of twenty- two feet from its span. There is a peculiarity remarked by architects in these buildings, which belong to a school termed the 44 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Byzantine, almost extinct as a form of modern ar- chitecture, — that the principal dome, which is their leading characteristic, unlike that of St. Paul's, or St. Peter's at Rome, is supported by four huge columns. Those in this church are said to have been part of the temple of the Sun at Baalbec. They are of porphyry ; but the fact of their coming from Baalbec rests upon no very good authority, as you will hereafter see ; and hence, when the circular wall is raised upon the pillar that has to bear the dome, its tendency is to bulge outwards. This has been cotrected in the dome of St. Paul's, by several strata of chains imbedded into the work ; in St. Sophia the architect has been compelled to raise im- mense solid buttresses on the outside, which griev- ously disfigure its external symmetry. Indeed, the simple truth must be confessed, that its exterior is extremely plain, ugly and shapeless. The emperor Justinian is said to have caused a picture of King Solomon to be painted and placed on an adjoining fountain, looking in an attitude of deep astonishment towards the church of St. Sophia. On the consecra- tion of the church, as if in rivalry of Solomon, 1000 oxen, 1800 sheep, 600 deer, 1000 pigs, 10,000 fowls, were slaughtered for the poor ; 30,000 measures of corn distributed, and several hundredweight of gold divided amongst them. It is also said, that during the consecration-service, as the emperor stood be- fore the high altar, and repeated the words, " I thank thee, God, that thou hast permitted me to complete this work," hardly were the words uttered than, al- most in the same breath, he added, '* Solomon, I have outdone thee I" ^ Leaving this ancient venerable building, now, for the sins of its former people, a mosque of the ' Professor Schubert's Reise in das Morgenland, yol. i. p. 179. CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 45 same God, but in servitude to a spurious law and revelation, we come to the mosque of Sultan Ach- met, which is really beautiful. It has been built, as indeed have all the Turkish mosques, after the form and pattern of St. Sophia ; but with a design suited to the beautiful minarets, which here are true and na- tural parts of the building, and not forcible additions, contrary to the spirit and character of the design, as in the case of St. Sophia. The exceeding cleanliness, elegance, simplicity and beauty of its interior cor- responded witli the fascinating symmetry of its many domes and minarets peeping out from the trees. This mosque looks down upon the Atmeidan, or Hippodrome ; and in its presence was accomplished that romantic tragedy of Ottoman history, die murder of the young Sultan Osman, by an insurrection of the well-known lawless Janissaries. How little did they foresee that the blood of their prince was to be the signal forerunner of their own, at the hands of a lineal descendant of their murdered monarch ! This very hippodrome was literally strewed with the limbs and corpses of massacred Janissaries, in the savage, but necessary, extermination of them, in 1826, by Sultan Mahmoud. The Suleimanieh was but a repetition of the pre- ceding : to an architect there may have been many interesting points of difference, but its general ap- pearance is much the same. The eye, and I may say the heart, sadly misses the high altar of the Christian church in these Oriental temples. The mihral, or Mahometan altar, is but a niche, on which to preserve the Koran, in such part of the edifice where it may be nearest Mecca : it is a mere mark or magnet indicating Mecca, wherever it is found. On the walls are written, in gold letters on blue ground, several sentences of the Koran, and other expres- sions of piety. They are for the most part unex- 46 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ceptionable, as may be seen from the full description J. Von Hammer's work contains ; as for instance, that in the Suleimanieh, " I have lifted up my eyes to Him who sustaineth heaven and earth." Indeed, on this, and, I may now add, on many subsequent occasions, how much have I been impressed with the truth, that no Christian can, or ought to return from among a Mahometan people without the deepest humiliation, at having witnessed how greatly they surpass him- self in fear and reverence for the Name, die House, the worship, and the laws of Almighty God. Were we not too proud, we have, as a Christian people, the opportunity of taking a lesson in the honour due to our Christian faith and profession from observing the devotion of the Mahometans. Constantinople is an engaging subject; and I fear, if I do not check myself I shall run on into the descriptive extravagances I have made bold to condemn ; and yet I must be permitted to plead for a few other little incidents before we quit this won- derful city, this paradox of dirt and beauty, filth and splendour, renovation and ruin. The first shall be the visit of the young Sultan to a mosque on the banks of the Bosphorus, the second Friday (the 12th) of the month of September 1839. The mosque lay in a little village, whose name I forget, about three miles from Pera; a lovely spot, enveloped in the richest foliage of trees, from the midst of which rose its well-formed dome, sur- rounded by four lovely minarets. Certainly the Turkish architects have well understood what is fas- cinating to the heart and eye. If ever I were con- verted to Mahommedanism, I think it would be the minaret which would work my conversion ; for there is something in its form, rising erect from the earth, its pure virgin whiteness, its tapering crown, pointing to heaven with so much simple and yet emblematic CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 47 dignity, it is scarcely possible to resist it. We were on the spot some little time before the sultan came, and it was at first a little uncertain whether he would come by land or water ; but in a short time the distant plash of many oars, and a large gaudy boat, its gilt sides glittering in the sun, pro- claimed that the young monarch was pleased to come by water. The pulling of his state-barge was perfection ; and, as the boat came ashore, out stepped the young monarch, and walked towards the mosque slowly, a carpet being laid for him, as in Clytem- nestra's reception of Agamemnon. We saw him to better advantage as he came out from the mosque, and went to spend a few hours in an adjoining kiosque ; but in the mean time I listened to hear any sounds of the service that might transpire. It ap- peared to consist of reading in some part of the Koran ; some singing, not very dissimilar to English village-church singing, and a sermon ; whether there is any form of liturgy, no one whom I could ask would or could tell me. In rather more than an hour the young prince came out ; and a more sickly, pale, inanimate and unmanly youth, I think I never saw : how different is the notion which has ob- tained in Europe! But what else can be expected from the immured life the heir of the throne is com- pelled to lead, shut up among the female slaves of the palace until the death of his predecessor lets the enervated wild beast loose upon practical life ? This is Turkish royal education. Perhaps some person may say. Oh for a national school for the Turkish princes ! No sooner was the young sultan safe from our view, than the officers of his suite came in for their share of the criticism. I wish I could venture to describe them ; but I dare not, for fear of being summoned to answer a charge of high- treason, for making light of the magnificence of the Sublime A VISIT TO THE KAST. Porte. It was the custom in Paris a short time ago, and perhaps it still continues, to aim at being Oriental, by wearing beards and almost shorn heads. As if, therefore, so liberal a concession towards eastern habits, on the part of one civilised European capital, would have been ungenerously dealt with, ex- cept some return had been made in kind, the Turks must needs shew their gratitude, the officers by wear- ing European coats, the sultan himself by a Euro- pean military-cloak, and his soldiers by short jackets, with pantaloons that still exhibit behind a sort of lingering uncured attachment to the ancient plenitude of that garment. The officers were a strange medley, with semi -European, semi-Turkish uniforms, Euro- pean buttons, and close by them the bright silver CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 49 crescent. A few years more of such mutual con- cession, and we shall find green turbans and curly beards upon French shoulders, salons turned into divans ; and in return, waltzes and quadrilles, smooth chins and better tailors, in the streets and houses of Istambul. Now every nation, as far as we can judge, is worthy of respect when its ancient customs and usages are upheld by its sovereign authorities. The old and respectable Turks therefore deplore and la- ment over the decline of their name and political existence, as evinced and portended by the European apings of their rulers. Infidelity is at the root of the French adoption of Eastern habits ; infidelity is at the bottom of the corresponding change in Con- stantinople ; and every religious mind among the Turks hates and abhors what it sees, and most justly so. There is something noble even in the contempt which a Turk has for the Frank, whom he esteems a giaour and an unbeliever. The same spirit, with a purer light of truth, would scorn to shake hands and pretend to a hollow friendship with Socinian or infi- del, however refined their manners might be, or how- ever apparently creditable their appearance. I con- fess, I never could resent the occasional giaour which one would now and then hear muttered from some fine old veteran Turk with a silver beard. I felt I deserved it — ^it was but my due — to him I was a giaour and unbeliever, and he was but acting up to his belief in calling me so. But so it is. The fine old Turkish feeling is gone from the government, and lingers yet in the devotion and reverence of the people ; but then, as a whole, it is nerveless, because infidelity poisons the fountain of all, viz. the sultan's government ; and can it be expected it should be otherwise, with the example of European diplomacy before their eyes ? 50 A VISIT TO THE EAST. So much for our view of the young sultan. Now for a visit to the howling, and the turning dervishes. The howling dervishes are a set of unhappy men who meet once a week to fall into ecstacies of howl- ing. They are an order of Mahometan monks ; but more than this I could not learn. The chief wears a red robe, and appears to be a respectable man. Thursday is the day they select for their ecstacies, which begin at twelve o'clock, and last till about half past one. I should hardly have mentioned this visit except as a curious instance of a very deep-seated error in Adam's race, carried to great excess — viz. the mistaking excitement as a token of some divine energy within. One must forget the sad displays made by the Puritans, in our own past history, and the raving excesses now too common among the sect commonly called Ranters, before the similar follies of these unhappy dervishes can provoke a smile. The same internal defect is at the root of both. It is remarkable how each country can detect the pre- vailing infirmities of another. I was talking of this very excess to my servant on the Nile, and rather laughing at it; he at once retorted by a similar criticism upon the fervour and vehement exertion of the Kyrie eleison in the Greek monks. The evil is the same every where in its essence, and consists in a desire to appear to others, in some especial man- ner, the subject of divine influence : a temper too common every where, and every where the opposite of true religion.. I shall not delay or disturb you by much description of them ; suffice it to say, they became quite as convulsed as they could bear; it was a horrid sight — the men shaking their heads imtil in due time some fell down from sheer ex- haustion. The turning or twirling dervishes are a much more amiable set of madmen. Their worship con- CH. III.] BOSPHORUS AND CONSTANTINOPLE. 51 slsts in a peculiar circular movement they make round a common centre, their heads all the while a little inclined, and their eyes almost shut. Their chief, who was a short, placid man with an amiable face, distinguished by a green turban from his followers who wore conical felt caps, about two feet high, of a tawny colour, generally sat down on one side, and only now and then rose to twirl himself into their solar system until he worked his way to the centre, where he would remain to watch the circular pro- gress of his satellites for some time, and then launch- ing into his orbit, he would describe an eccentric course, and so come back to his own place ; all the while not so much as a fibre in his own face, or in the faces of his followers, losing its fixed repose. There seemed, as their revolving proceeded, as if ^ magnetised tranquillity of look and feature stole upon, and entirely absorbed them, — the very har- mony of the spheres appeared fixed and settled in their faces — and thus they kept turning away — a sight which few Europeans could see long without laughing, for it must be confessed we are sadly irre- verential in most matters of religion. Europeans are now brought so much in contact with Eastern habits, that some difficulty must doubtless be often experienced by Eastern people, what to make of us ; for many things which are by them considered to be sacred, provoke an ignorant laugh from us. A European, for instance, did once burst into a loud fit of laughter at this scene ; whereupon the chief immediately entered upon his orbit, and gradually drawing, each circle, nearer to the offender, at last gave him a severe box on the ear, and then con- tinued his revolution without so much as the move of an eyelid. The names of these dervishes are the Mewlewis, and they are supposed to be the remains of the worship of Zoroaster, the Persian. 52 A VISIT TO THE EAST. It is difficult to quit so entertaining a scene ; but with a short notice of the residence of the Greek patriarch I must conclude. The church of St. George, close to which is the Patriarch's house, is on the way to Ayoub, near the gate of the Fanal. It is a plain sort of building, full of dingy pictures, chiefly of patriarchs and bishops of old times ; some paintings of the punishment of the condemned spirits, among whom are the figures of Julian the Apostate, and Maximian, which may be known rather by the label they bear than by their resemblance. In the interior is kept the chair of the great St. Chrysostom, wherein the patriarch seats himself on the occasion of any great festival. Not far from St. George's church there is the church and house of the patri- arch of Jerusalem, and of the bishop of Bethlehem. These are on the outside of the gate ; but we did not go to visit them. And now I must take my leave. CHAPTER IV. It is one of ihe disadvantages of being in a hurry, that numberless interesting objects must be passed over for the sake of what is to come. But then it is one of the pecuhar features of the American and English character, that with or without reason they are invariably in a hurry to advance. It would seem as if the chief pleasure in reaching any distant point consisted in power thereby gained to leave it immediately for some other. Now whe- ther this be alii^ether that frame of mind which renders travel pleasant and profitable, I shall not pretend to decide ; I am stating a fact. But it must be admitted to be more than doubtful, if Herodotus or Ulysses had been bom under the in- fluence of such an Anglomania, whether we should 54 A VISIT TO THE EAST. now be in possession either of the Odyssey or the Muses. As a people, we are confessedly the most erratic of all the nations upon the earth ; for though a portion of the same inquiring spirit exists in some measure among the Germans, and leads them a good deal from home, it is certain to exhibit it- self with them in a far simpler, more subdued, and patient form. But there is no other country which sends forth its private individuals upon their own resources into all corners and nooks of the earth to the same extent that we do. We are the only people who have seemed to consider it a point of national ambition to hoist our flag at the North Pole. We are the only people who ever conceived the idea of climbing to the top of Pompey's Pillar ; and, what is more, have bond fide climbed up. No one but an Englishman would publish a work of tra- vels, and intimate that its peculiar merit was, that its author had penetrated further into the interior of Africa than any European had ever penetrated before him. We are the only people who ever think of attempting to cross the passes of the Hi- malaya mountains, simply because it is dangerous, and the natives abstain at such times. We are the only people who would gallop down a winding road, for the sole purpose of trying the experiment how safely sharp corners might be turned at full speed ; and none but an Englishman would climb up the smooth surface of the lower of the two pyramids of Ghizeh, for the sake of the risk of slipping, and be- cause of the possibility of breaking his neck. In a word, the Englishman's motive for doing any thing on his travels appears to be in no degree either for his own comfort, his information, or his improve- ment in any one way, but simply because it is un- certain whether he may or may not come by his end ; or else it is because no one but himself has CH. IV.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 55 ever done the same thing. I am not saying that a great deal of useful information, that a great deal of gallant conduct, of humanity, steadiness, for- titude, resolution, and courage, is not frequently dis- played during these adventures ; or that they have not opened many channels to commerce, brought away much valuable and practical information, and in diousands of ways resulted happily and bene- ficially; — I am merely saying, that these results are not in general the motives, and form no part of the original calculation ; but that a blind, adven- turous spirit, and a love of difficulties as difficulties, does all. No designs of any deep latent import carried Mungo Park to Timbuctoo ; Bruce had no earthly motive in wishing to see the sources of the Nile, except that none else had seen them : and yet the visit of the one has led to infinite attempts to spin commercial relations with the interior of Africa ; the second has brought about a perfect mental revolution towards the wonders of ancient Egypt and Nubia. If a native of any other nation, particularly a Frenchman, undertake a long distant journey, he has generally some definite motive ; he must be either a naturalist, an academician of Paris, or at least member of some royal institute ; he is expected to make some astonishing scientific dis- coveries, and, what is more, he is sure to make them somehow! Such were the savans who ac- companied the French expedition into Egypt ; and such perhaps in some minor degree were die demi^ savanSf as the army termed the beasts they rode upon. Now when learned men are bent upon discovery, it will go hard but they will discover something. Accordingly, the above mentioned sa- vans discovered that the Temple of Denderah, in Upper Egypt, was one of the oldest remains in the country, and, reasoning from some sculptures repre- 56 A VISIT TO THE EAST. senting an animal zodiac, they inferred, beyond a doubt, that its date was more than 5000 years anterior to the Mosaic era of the creation of the world. This wonderful result of the powers of science was loudly heralded forth in France; the only misfortune being that, upon the discovery of the hieroglyphical cipher, the temple in question was ascertained to be the work of one of the later Ptolemies, and, so far from anticipating the Mosaic era of creation, it was in reality nearly as many years subsequent to that era as they in their phi- losophic wisdom had placed it before ! Now an Englishman carries with him every where his national and constitutional imprint of haughtiness and reserve; wherever he is, he must be master, or else sullen! whereas a German is always cheerful and good-humoured. A German is the most useful and patient of all travellers ; he is compelled to move economically, and to adapt himself to the habits and methods of the country. He has no superabundance of guineas to shed around him the halo of a London atmosphere; to eat fresh salmon in pots at the cataracts of Wadi Haifa, is not perpetually before him as the promised reward of his pains : but he goes in a quiet credulous way, sifting and wondering, and shewing far more shrewdness at a bargain than over any other question; and yet always kind, friendly, hospitable, and far the pleasantest com- panion on the whole. Never tiring, every object, however minute, rewards him for the labour of looking patiently at it. A Frenchman is all life, courage and animation at times, and at times all cowardice and depression. A German is cautious and wary, not afraid of and certainly not fond of danger. A Frenchman is all enthusiasm for adven- ture in the abstract, but faint and good for nothing CH. lY.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 57 when it comes near; indeed, except it be for the interests of ** science," and with the whole Royal Academy in his thoughts, he is worth nothing. But enough of this digression ; we are coming amongst other scenes and other travellers. We left Constantinople on board the Stambul steamer on Tuesday the 17th September, about six in the evening ; it was nearly calm, and on rounding the point, we came in sight of this queen of cities as she is seen from the sea, with an evening sun retiring like ourselves from the prospect. There is something melancholy, in spite of all high spirits and adventure, and in spite of all the queer people and strange sights, in such an object as this city, receding gradually from view as die distance kept increasing, and the clouds and dusk of evening closed and settled over it. The tall white minarets of the mosques were visible for many hours, seemingly tinged with a waning glow from the remains of sunset light ; and at last we were obliged to say farewell perhaps for ever. It was calm all the night, and we were up early in the morning to survey the passage of the Dardanelles; but were disappointed by the com- parative tameness of their bmiks. Gallipoli is cer- tainly a respectable town on the right hand, situated at the mouth and close to the first fortress. In about three hours we had passed through ; the coast in general winding and without feature, far inferior to the Bosphorus. At Sestos tlie stream forms a kind of bay, where the fort, so called, is built : the opposite one, still retaining the name Abydos, (it is wonderful how these ancient names remain,) is built upon a narrow neck of land. This is that spot so renowned in history by the nocturnal swim- mings of Leander, and after him, of Lord Byron. It was here that Xerxes marched his army across upon boats. The forts are not many in number. 58 A VISIT TO THE EAST. but very low, and hardly at all defended by land ; they possess, however, the well-known guns, the stone shot of which weighs nearly two hundred weight, and requires as much as five minutes in loading. The passage has been forced by some frigates in our service, but with great loss. The entrance from the sea is guarded by two modem forts, the new Dardanelles ; Sestos and Abydos being the old Dardanelles. On coming into the open sea the Isle of Imbros is seen to the north; and be- fore arriving off Tenedos, a few nameless islands are visible, sometimes distinguished as the Rabbit Islands. A solitary hermit pig is said to dwell upon one of them, though of the date and manner of his arrival in his domains there is no extent tradition. On coming near Tenedos we were gra- tified by tlie unusual and noble sight of the two combined fleets of Great Britain and France; in all nineteen sail of the line, ten English and nine French. The French were anchored in line, with their flag-^ip at their head, the English in the form of a crescent close to shore, with their sails hung loose to dry. The admiral's ship, a three- decker, had in no way the neat sailor-like appearance of the Frenchman ; and, I think, a fair, unprejudiced spectator, with nothing but his general knowledge as landsman of naval matters, could hardly avoid forming a much more favourable opinion of the French. However, naval architecture does not win sea-fights; Archimedes himself might build ships, but sailors are not made in dock-yards ; and as we passed I could not help wondering at the strange revolution in the wheel of diplomacy that had laid alongside of each other, in peaceful proximity, forces that centuries and even years ago had sought each other's company for quite different purposes. We passed between the two fleets, and con- CH. IV.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 59 tinued our way in sight of the celebrated plains of Troy. It would appear that the learned world are at no little fault upon the momentous question of the whereabouts of the ancient city. Lysimachus, say the historians, one of the generals of Alexander the Great, received orders from his master to rebuild Troy. Now there are ruins of Alexander's Troas, the town he is supposed to have built, near the sea at the south of the plain ; and the point in debate is, whether Lysimachus might or might not have been mistaken in taking a then existing tradition, if he did so, as true, which is now found hardly capable of being reconciled with the localities described by Homer himself. Prokesch, a German author of recent date, examines the evidence on each side of this important matter ; and but that the encomiastic tone of Germans about eastern antiquarian objects is a great obstacle in the way of their being under* stood, it would appear from his account, that the true site of Homer s Troy is close by the Simois, a rocky torrent which falls into the more canal-like Scamander, at the mouth of which latter river within the Dardanelles, the Grecian fleet landed. It was here that Achilles spent the whole period of his sullen absence in a tent, while the camp may have been about ten miles off; the city, perhaps, about one or two more. The supposed site, then, as ascertained or conjectured by M. Prokesch, com- mands a view of the plain, and lies under Mount Ida, at some considerable distance from the site of Alexander's Troy. There are some tumuli on the sea-shore, to which tradition assigns the name of the tombs of Hector, Ajax, and Patroclus ; but with what authority it is impossible to say. Passing onwards, we doubled Cape Baba, and our course lay between the mainland and the an- cient Lesbos, now called after its old chief city Mi- 60 A VISIT TO THE EAST. tylene. The coasts of both are rocky, and the view highly agreeable, as you may well imagine with a clear blue sea, a sober afternoon sun, and an Ionian sky. Abqut four o'clock we came in view of the ancient Mitylene, built on the side of the hill and very prettily situated in a small bay ; the ancient Acropolis having very possibly occupied the site of the present fort. Its siege by the Athenians in the Peloponnesian war, and the narrow escape of all its inhabitants from the anger of their conquer- ors, have given to it a kind of renown in history, which may be said to have derived some kindred increase by certain bloody scenes, of which it was the theatre in the late rebellion of the Greeks. In Horace's time it appears to have borne a fair cha- racter for beauty and pleasantness. On leaving this island, we keep the .interior of the country in full view up to the entrance of the bay of Smyrna, where the high land closes in on both sides ; and in about three hours the ship arrives at the ancient town of Smyrna. Ismir or Smyrna, one of the two surviving churches whose candlestick has not been removed, more an- ciently in pagan times one of the twelve Ionian cities, is now a principal mart of Turkish and European commerce. The trade of all nations is in its har- bours, and nearly all spoken languages in its streets. It is a little better built than most Turkish towns, a little more cleanly, and altogether has some faint tinge of a European character. Now, as bazaars are in the East the great rendezvous of all the busi- ness and idleness of the town, we resorted to them to spend the day, and to make a few necessary pur- chases before entering upon the wilds of Syria. All that ever was or could be said, would never give an European a just idea of an eastern bazaar. You may, it is true, imagine a labyrinth of archways, so CH. lY.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 61 constructed as to admit both light and darkness, — the light, as it might be, serving only to make the darkness discernible ; you may gain some kind of a notion of the place and territory belonging to each tradesman or artificer ; you may conceive a little keen-eyed grave man, very commonly the fabricant of his own wares, and have an indistinct vision of east- em dresses ; but the singular character of his goods no European can ever know, until he goes and sees for himself. The cross-legged, venerable, long-robed occupant of a small divan waits in expectant re- pose, with the cell close at hand, that contains his wares, on all sides and even suspended above his head. Like the monument of some poet or states- man in Europe, which is enveloped with figures and emblems, all supposed to shew off the real genius himself to advantage, so sits the eastern ven- dor in the midst of his domains, a very emblem and personification of trade. And, whether working or waiting, he surveys the passing multitude with a degree of calm insouciance and mingled dignity, with a full collected gravity and yet benevolent aspect, which is to be looked for in vain in the dapper impertinence of the satellites of an European shop. Together with a sprinkling of divers sinister Europeans, upon whose faces no other passion but the love of dollars is stamped, there are all manner of surrounding tribes, doubtless owning kindred with the nations of Xerxes' army, each in their national dress ; and since the Oriental taste has a strong lean- ing toward gaudy colours, you will hardly see any one description of costume like its fellow. The prac- tised eye can distinguish the merchant, the military, and the learned, by the peculiar twist of the turban, and even the rank they hold in their vocation may be known by the same index. But these are minute 62 A VISIT TO THE EAST. shades of difference that are completely lost to the eye of the stranger. There is one very pleasing trait of character in the Turk merchant, which it is hut just to notice, viz. that he is the only one who may he trusted ; he asks, it is true, a price a little above what he will take, but this is scarcely more than a conventional form for the pleasure of the dialogue, during which his demand subsides to his real price. Indeed, it is not at all unusual with them to refuse the offer of a bargain upon the terms first proposed, and at once to state their real price, if they find the stranger not aware of the local practice, and dis- posed to make a straightforward purchase. Above all persons, the visitor must beware of the insidious Frank or Greek, who is ever lying in wait to offer his assistance to complete a bargain; he is invari- ably a rogue, and lives upon the premium of mis- leading. In a scene of this kind you may well con- ceive how entertaining a day could be spent. In the evening we visited the fort, or rather the Genoese ruin which commands the town, but in what cen- tury it was built no one could say ; indeed, so given up is the city to its commercial pursuits, that it is a great question who are the most ignorant of its history, — the guides, who profess to relate every thing, or the resident inhabitants. In fact, almost the only thing not to be found in the city is a book- seller's shop containing works of real information. We embarked for Syria in the Seri Pervas steamer late in the evening, and by morning were off Scio — Homer's home, a rocky bare island, where a blind man could have nothing much to regret : here we stayed half an hour, and about noon came in sight of Nixaria and Samos, and after we had passed between them, there lay to the right a little group of islands, the Fermi. Patmos, the scene of St. John's banish- ment, next came in sight ; and« as this spot is de- CH. IV.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 63 servedly an object of sincerest interest to every Christian, I shall stay to extract Professor Schu- bert's description, as he found and visited it a few years ago (in 1839). Patmos appears to be, from the professor's de- scription, one of those happy retreats which the Christian religion does yet possess, unknown to the world, and not as yet blown upon by its treacherous commendation. It is full of little chapels, scattered all over the island, and possesses a population a little exceeding four thousand, of whom more than three parts are females. As the island is a com- plete rock, this industrious people live principally by petty trade at sea ; and it is no uncommon thing for the mother and daughters to occupy the patern^ cottage, while the father and eldest sons are seek- ing elsewhere on the Asiatic coast a subsistence for their family by trade or labour. Domestic peace, virtue, happiness, and simple arts of life, all centre round a deep attachment to their Church, founded by the apostle who was banished here; and most justly do these men boast that not one of their num- ber, during the convulsions that ensued among the islanders upon the great Greek rebellion against the Turks, became a pirate, or was known to commit a single act of violence. Their chief characteristic is the simple retirement of their lives, without os- tentation, living up to the faith they profess in word and deed, and bringing up their children to better things than the knowledge of the nineteenth cen- tury — as the apostle directs, in the fear and ad- monition of the Lord. Long may they be protected from the educating philanthropies of Europe I It is quite pleasing to find a European speak of the genuine kindness and hospitality, and the hearty good will, which all ranks shewed to him during the four days he remained on the island. When 64 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the education of our own country bears such fruit aa this, it will he a time for general rejoicing. The two engravings annexed to this chapter give, the one a general view of the island, the other of the grotto of St. John the apostle, which old tradition as- signs as the spot where the Revelation was given to him. It is described as follows in the professor's own narrative : — " But what was to me the chief attraction, was the grotto of the apostle St. Jolm, with a small plain chapel, commanding a noble pruspect over the still soli^ry inlet of the sea and its rocky coast. It was here, according to a legend resting upon credible ancient tradition, and coming from the mouth of his first followers, that the apostle lived during the period of his banishment; here he re- ceived the revelation of things to come." With the following little description of the school adjoin- ing, which has played no inconsiderable part in the simple annals of Patmos, we must take leave of the island and the professor. " As we approached the grotto, we were greeted by a friendly old man of learned aspect, who offered us, in the Eastern man- CH. lY.] THE LEVANT AND ASIATIC ISLANDS. 65 ner, some sweetmeats of the country, with fresh water, araki, and then coffee. The walls of the school-room were covered with maps, and all man- ner of materials for general instruction. This school, whose doctors have been renowned among many of the same profession, especially for their acquaintance with ancient Greek literature, has, in former genera- tions, educated many useful clergymen and men of business, and has been frequented by many indus- trious scholars from all parts of Greece. Even now it possesses no inconsiderable fame, although it does not pretend to competition with the abor- tive brood of new schools in Greece as lately esta- blished." The remainder of our course from Patmos to Cos lay between different little islands and the main- land : we remained some time at Cos, sailed away in the night, and came to Rhodes early in the morning, where we were to remain a few hours. We accord- ingly lost no time in going on shore, to make the most of the stay allowed by the steamer's program. Before entering Rhodes in its ruins, we must, if you please, see what Rhodes has once been. Rhodes is one of Horace's beauties ; but, then, so was Delos a favourite of Apollo, and Cythera of Venus ; and yet both islands are notorious for their ugliness. If 1 mistake not, the Rhodians were a Greek tribe of Mohan origin, and possessed a very flourishing community in the time of the Grecian and Persian wars, principally by means of trade and shipping. They seem to have fared on the whole pretty well, by keeping on good terms with the great power of the time being ; and in later times, successfully sus- tained the severest siege ever known in history, carried on against them by the well-known Deme- trius Poliorcetes, son of Antigonus emperor of Syria. To celebrate this victory they erected the great o2 66 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Colossus, eighty yards high, which in fifty-six years afterwards was broken to pieces by an earthquake. There it remained in fragments, until one of the caliphs had the pieces removed to Asia, and car- ried away upon nine hundred camels, in the year 653. Rhodes continued, after this siege, the great rendezvous of painters and statuaries, and contrived to maintain a sort of independence, until it was taken by Cassius in the last war of the Roman republic, and became finally a Roman province under Vespa- sian. From this time it was an appendage of Rome, and subsequently of the eastern empire of Constan- tinople ; and then, falling into the hands of the Arabs, it was taken from them by the Genoese ; in 1311 becoming the possession of the knights of St. John, and remaining in their possession until Sultan Suleiman subdued the island, after a forty years' siege, that began in the time of his grandfather, Mo- hammed II. ; since that time it has continued in the hands of the Turks. The town and fortress of Rhodes lies in the form of a crescent ; the two horns of which come down to the harbour, now divided into three parts. We came in our boat through the middle division, and picking up the first person who offered himself as a guide, entered by the principal gate and advanced north- wards, up a street in which the ancient habitations of the knights of St. John were on our right, in ruins, but still serving as the dwellings of some poor families. Their different shields and devices still remained, and here and there Maltese crosses shewed tliemselves on all parts of the walls. At the top of the street we turned to the left, and entered a mosque, that had formerly been a church belong- ing to their order, but found only a few tokens of its former character, bare walls, and a few defaced tombstones. The Mahometan faith forbids an imi- CH. IV.] THE LEVANT AMD ASIATIC ISLANDS. 67 tation of the human fonii, or indeed that of any other animal life. The altar also was taken away. On the right-hand side of the same street are remains of what appeared to have been the cathedral church. A great part was still standing, but fast going to de- cay. Quitting this part of the town by a number of crooked alleys, we came in sight of the fortifications, consisting of an outer wall and double fosse. On the wall were several of the guns that discharge the stone shot, with apertures as if meant for casks rather than cannon, and capable of affording ample room for any cynical Turk who might think them desirable as a solid refuge from the world. Several of the stone shot lie about the guns, and here and there they have been used to repair the breaches they no doubt helped to make : a curious instance of inanimate retribu- tion ! We passed outside the walls, and came upon a Turkish cemetery ; its gravestones in the usual sad disorder, its surface bearing a luxuriant abundance of thistles, the present representatives of the roses which once gave the name to the island. Tiring of this scene, and finding the dust disagreeable, we re-entered the town as soon as possible by another gate. The streets were far too narrow to admit of a carriage ; and this part of the town had some- thing subterraneous about it, from the number of archways sustaining buildings which connect one house with its opposite neighbour, together with dis- tinct traces of many more having once existed. On attempting to mount the inner wall, we were pre- vented by a sentinel ; and at last determined to ask the pasha's permission to go where we liked, parti- cularly to see the castle that commanded the little harbour. While waiting for the return of our guide with the keys, the garrison, that had been exercising outside the walls, passed by, with European music, in tolerable order. Something less in number than 68 A VISIT TO THE BAST. a regiment, but sadly jumbled tjogether ; blacks and whites, boys and veterans, short and tall, and all meagre, dirty and ill-dressed; on the whole, worse than the raw recruits of Constantinople. At last our guide came, and we were taken to see the tower, at the entrance of the harbour ; the view from whence gives an excellent idea of the town of Rhodes and its position. Here were the old cannons of the knights mixed with Turkish guns in prime confu- sion ; pieces of old breastplates covering the touch- holes, and the whole allowed to rust and go to decay, until they would be far more dangerous for the de- fenders to fire than for the enemy to receive the dis- charge. Where the Colossus may have stood, I could form no judgment ; the buildings must have under- gone some considerable change since its time, as there is certainly no spot answering to the description we have of it, that a trireme could enter the harbour through the span of its legs. On quitting Rhodes, the noble coast of Cilicia continued for many hours in view, on the left ; and on Sunday, the 2Sd, we arrived at Lamaka in Cyprus, on the south side of the island. Cyprus fell into the hands of Sultan Selim II. in the year 1571, after en- during a very singular succession of tyrannical rulers. In fact, all these islands of the Archipelago and the Levant have their history, little known it is true, but only so '* carent quia yate sacro." It is celebrated for little else now than its sweet wine ; and certainly the part of the island where we landed has a truly woful appearance, being little else but white sickly coloured chalk land, covered with nothing but weeds and thistles. There are but few Turks ; and the Greek population, as far as we could judge from the specimen of Larnaka, miserable and destitute enough. I purchased some old coins, which CH. IT.] THE I.EVANT AND ASIATIC l«LANt>S. 69 an intelligent store-keeper assured me were brought to him by the country people ; and I paid dear enough for them, as tbey proved to be nothing but the common copper coinage of the Eastern empire after its separation from the Roman. The climate is extremely variable, being subject to the malaria fe- vers. The following morning brought us in view of the range of Lebanon, to Beirnut, on the Syrian coast, where some of our fellow- passengers landed to per- form quarantine. The Lebanon range of mountains has a noble appearance from the sea, the more so perhaps from its bearing that peculiar glow which an Eastern sky casts over rocks and heights, but to which European climes are strangers. On the morning of the Wednesday we found ourselves at our own destination, on the fatal brink of our own quarantine at the town of Jaffa. We had seen our friends at Beirout towed off in a boat to their prison with something like merriment ; it was now our turn to make the best of our own fate, for it was inevitable. CHAPTER V. QUARANTINE, AND ITS EMPLaTMBNTS. So soon as an Eastern adventurer can take pattern by the amiable patience every where displayed by the native Turks and Arabs, when the matter before them consists in waiting for the expiration of a given time, then and then only, he is prepared to derive the full legitimate enjoyment of a visit to the East. England and America are the only countries for those who cannot wait ; impatient men should never leave them. This may be in some degree national tone of mind, in some degree constitution ; but certainly Englishmen are the least able to wait, and Turks the most so, of any people I have ever seen. To impede an Englishman's locomotion on a journey is equivalent to stopping tlie circulation of his blood ; to disturb the repose of a Turk on his, is to re-awaken him to a painful sense of the miseries of life. The one nation at rest is as much tormented as Prome- theus chained to his rock, with the vulture feeding upon him ; the other in motion is as uncomfortable as Ixion tied to his ever-moving wheel : they are the antipodes of each other. If ever perpetual motion be discovered, the discovery will arise from England ; if ever philosophy should enforce universal rest, the prescribing sage will be a Turk, and his people the first professors. Some such thoughts were forced upon me, as we took possession of our new quarters, on observing the contrasted impatience of my friends, and the happy content of our Turkish fellow-passen- CH. v.] QUARANTINE — ITS EMPLOYMENTS. 71 gers. Let moralists decide between the two tem- pers ; that such they are is not to be doubted. But, ailer all, even an Englishman may be very happy in quarantine, if he wUl ; for indeed a little time is really needed to collect the thoughts previous to entering upon groimd that it would be pro^e to trample over with the common current unsubdued curiosity which leads us to pry into the manners and ways of other lands and people. There is the ^oc^, that this is really the East, the land in which our fa- ther Abraham (I say our father, for " in Isaac is thy seed called**) lived in a tent a "stranger,** owning not one foot of ground, and buried in a cave bought with his money of the stranger ; that this is the land where his children after the flesh became a mighty nation and possessed it ; where they served God, and he blessed them ; where they rebelled against him, and were chastised ; where God ordained kings for them, some of whom were prophets, some ido- lators ; where successive revelations were given to them ; and, lastly, where the Redeemer and Judge of all men lived and suffered. Again ; the very barrenness of the land is now a testimony to the truth of that revelation which men continue to despise, just as they have ever done from the time it was given to them. But should there not be sufficient in this wherewith to occupy the thoughts, few travellers will arrive at this point of their journey without having seen more or less of eastern manners on their way ; now all eastern manners are a living testimony to the pre- vious existence of a state of society, and a general tone of mind and thought, similar to that which we find narrated in the Scripture ; for this is precisely that patrimony which one generation hands on to its successor. There is then leisure for a travel- ler during his first quarantine, to recal all he has hitherto seen, to compare it with what he knows of 72 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the holy Scripture, and thus to prepare himself for a keener observation of the innumerable trifling points, in which the daily and ordinary cottage life of Syria bespeaks those previously existing customs. For all that he will see are their surviving descendants, proclaiming their hereditary connexion with the times in which God spake by his prophets. And should this mine of thought fail him, then if he be an historian, let him search his memory for the facts which are stored up in it collected from all the profane authors whom he may have read, and digest them into an accessible form, for he will greatly need them wherever he goes. In this manner he need not be at a loss, and if he is, let him blame himself: let him cook his dinner himself, sweep up the corner of his room with his towels, pack and unpack his trunk, and after all, he will not be half as happy as the guardian who sits at the railing with a long broom- stick pipe, quietly, smoking. Indeed, there is amply sufficient to occupy even more than a fortnight, if it were only employed in collecting such practical pieces of intelligence as the guardian, or the consul and his dragoman, or the good padre vicario of the convent, who with real Christian kindness comes daily to look after the comforts of the Europeans, can communicate orally. There are so many practical pieces of caution, of advice how to manage, of directions where to go, so much may be done in laying out time to advantage by studying the map, or by refreshing the memory by reference to any little work of statistics or history, that time can only hang heavily upon such as never employ it to any practical or useful purpose. I shall not, now, weary you with a history of our troubles and inconveniences before we were really settled ; they were fimny enough, and afforded us ample amusement to remedy and reform them. In CH. v.] QUARANTINE ITS EMPLOYMENTS. 73 &ct, 1 think many of us evince a latent genius for cookery, that might but for pressing necessity have slumbered undiscovered and unknown to its possessor. But to put in practice my own doctrines, let us see if there is nothing that can be remembered of the scenes lately gone through, suitable to the state of calm reflective rest which we had now to enjoy. One prophecy for the future I have never heard questioned by any who have obtained either much or little acquaintance with the Turkish empire, which when realised, can hardly fail sadly to disturb the calm tranquillity of its people ; and this is that it is fast crumbling to pieces. There can be no question of it. Statesmen are busy at work applying plasters, diplomatists prescribing remedies, but in vain : the life of the people is gone. All that Europe can do for Turkey is but the labour of the dentist filling a decayed tooth : the decay goes on, and the patching up has but prolonged the patient's own pain without obtaining a cure. If I am asked, what are the to- kens whereby this is so evident, as to be an universal observation volunteered by all who see the people in their present condition ? I must answer, — Men may come to the same conclusion from different causes ; but where all coincide in a matter of practical judg- ment, it will go hard but there is some foundation for their surmises. My own reason is a plain one. I see the government becoming infidel; and hence I foresee the ruin of the people. They will be pu- nished for the trangression of their rulers. Now it is impossible not to be struck with the exceeding devotion and faithful service of God, which the true Turk of the old school every where exhi- bits. His word may be implicitly trusted, his life is simple, he never neglects his prayers, he is po- lite, dignified, hospitable, and even kind to strangers. For the Christian who is sincere in his faith he has H 74 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the greatest respect, and Giaour and Nazaran are rather terms of contempt for those who disgrace, as we do, our Christian profession, than for those who live in the practical fear of God, though they avow the Christian covenant. Such a man is brave, cour- teous, industrious, not impatient, dignified, sober, and is a character that would do honour to any people. Judging from the history of the Turkish and Christian wars, the same materials of character may be traced in them, urged on by the enthusiastic Moslim spirit, which met widi a corresponding antagonist in the devotion of the Christian knighthood. Such was certainly the character of the first century of their European career ; for the government of the Sultan allied itself to the faith of the people, and Chris- tendom felt the scourge sent upon it for its want of faith. The first sultans were warriors and sub- sisted by conquest, and the religious enthusiasm of the people was fed and kept alive by religious war; they fought for their faith, and maintained and ex- tended it. But the two last centuries have exhibited a corresponding decline ; and the cause I conceive to be deeply seated in the nature and constitution of the Koran, upon which their state is compacted. I shall have occasion to return to this subject iagain ; but must here shortly state, that we have an imperfect idea of the Mahometan religion. The Ma- hometan people fear God, and pray to him far more than Christian people in general do ; they make men- tion of Mahomet in their prayers, but they never pay to him the worship due to God only. We terra Mahomet an imposter; and I think justly so: yet, when I see millions of people worshipping the true and only God, God in unity ; and that this has been brought about by an Arab of the name of Maliomet (in Arabic Mohammed), that the people commonly exhibit a deeper and profounder sense of the majesty CH. v.] QUARANTINE ITS EMPLOYMENTS. 75 of God, of his judgments, and of his mighty and out- stretched arm, than multitudes of Christians do, — I have at least a proof that God is pleased to over- rule human deceit, and make it reform the course of his worship upon earth. There is nothing to shake my faith as a Christian in the fact: I can never know why it pleased the Almighty that the preparation for Christ's coming should have been so long ; neither can I know why it is his good will that mighty na- tions call upon his name, and fear to commit vice and wickedness, as knowing it to be abomination be- fore his eyes, dirough the instrumentality of a man named Mohammed. This man may, notwithstanding his imposture, have been an instrument in the hands of God ; and if he used deceit, it must be remem- bered, so did Jacob to obtain the blessing ; so did the Israelite women to obtain the Egyptian jewels ; so did Ehud when he slew Eglon ; so did Jehu when he murdered the priests of Baal : and yet we do not brand them as imposters. Now, Mohammed was certainly a deceiver ; but I think that until we are in a state to take no practical lesson from the zeal of his followers, we should abstain from speaking ill of him. However, the Koran of Mohammed is the law of a people sent for some work of chastisement ; it has no element of social permanent duration ; it has the knowledge of God in unity ; it has no know- ledge of the gospel-graces ; it has not the gospel- covenant of redemption from sin by sacrifice ; it knows neither God the Redeemer, nor God the Sanc- tifier. If, therefore, the Mahometan nations exhibit more of the fear of God, and more respect for his law, than the Christian nations, there is unquestionably a deep mystery connected with the reason of this, which, it may be, we cannot know. The Christian faith being the seal of God's revealed truth, Christ 76 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Jesus is either the way, the truth, and the life, or a stone whereon if a man fall he shall be broken, but if it fall upon him it will grind him to powder. The Koran law is the law of a conquering people, not of a permanent state ; and therefore, when the Turkish or Mahometan element of the vast empire, now called Ottoman, had fairly grasped its territory by conquest, from that time to this, the ties which cemented it together have been yielding, and infi- delity has been eating its destructive way more and more into the heart and vitals of the people ; it has ruined and changed the government, and spreading its upas-poison it has tainted the high tone of feel- ing which gave a real grandeur and dignity to the Turkish character, of which we have little conception in this country, and which an age degraded and de- based as our own is by the same infidelity, is as inca- pable of discerning as it is of appreciating. Only trace the change that has come over our own nation during the last fifty years, and what do we see? the sanctity of home gone; parents wandering abroad in search of tawdry cheap accomplishments, in lieu of English virtues and English happiness ; wealth increasing, and with it the necessity for economy ; each class treading upon the heels of the one above it ; and knowledge of worldly objects spreading every where, together with irfbiieased crime ; and God only knows what increase of those sins which his eye seeth in se- cret. What respect have we for the old revered cha- racter of the once hospitable merry-hearted English country gentleman, whose tenants were his friends, and he their adviser? Where is such a character now ? or, if still lingering, what is our opinion of him? Now the same change has come over the Turkish nation which has gone far to make us a con- temptible people. They are fast learning to make a mock at the old virtues of their ancestors, those man- CH. v.] QUARANTINE ITS EMPLOYMENTS. 77 ners and the tone of thought which are not the birth of a day, but a patrimony and inlieritance coming down to them from dieir forefathers. Their military are now in European costume, which they hate and wear as the sign of their degradation. Their Sultan, the head of Islam, wears epaulettes — proh pudor.f and a coat tailored by a Frank — proh scelusf They have in- troduced French wines, they use knives and forks, they sit upon chairs, they come to the European balls : — all betokens the march of intellect, and the decline of faith. And what is the result ? their ar- mies run away ; the Janissaries rise in rebellion, and are butchered by thousands and tens of thousands ; the paltry new-fangled force falls before the noise of a few muskets ; the refined intellectual officers betray their trust ; one gives up his master's fleet to a rebel ; nervelessness, imbecility, distrust, suspicion, take the place of former unity, valour and devotion. The root is rotten, can we look for fruit ? the head is crazed, can we look for action and success ? This is the way in which modern diplomacy busies and bestirs itself to raise up a bulwark against the encroachments of Russia ; as if an emperor who, what- ever be his ambition, is too religious not to discern that the fear of God is the life of the state, was not calmly surveying Balaam thft son of Bosor working, under the guise of European assistance, the ruin of this ancient dynasty, and effectually doing that desirable work which they foolishly imagine they are preventing. That the ambition of Russia leads her to desire this key of her empire we all know ; and the day is not far distant when no power can say to her nay. This her statesmen know right well ; only our infidel politi- cians do not know that they are doing her work, in the measures by which they seek to prolong an ailing existence for Turkey. To strengthen a power, the tenure of whose political existence is the integrity of h2 78 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the Mahometan fiedth, by European applicadons, in- volying a denial of the deepest and I may say ho- liest prejudices of that faith, is an act of blindness little less, than if a chemist were to attempt to pre- serve the colours of marble by the application of strong acids, or an entomologist a coUection of rare larvse in a solution of caustic The only principle which the history of man- kind attests, as containing the secret of the dura- bility of states, is the fear of God. Now it is im- possible to read pagan literature without discerning, under the veil of their mythol(^, a practical sense of the majesty of God, influencing the mass of the people ; and since each generation of mankind, no matter in what nation or what century they may be bom, inherits from its forefathers its stock of prin- ciples and maxims, its tones of mind, and its code of manners, so herein is to be discerned another subordinate principle of durability connected with the former, and that is, veneration for the past and its memorials. A people that cast off their alliance in heart and affection with their past history, can have very little prospect for that which is to come. For the reason of this we must look deep. It has its root in no idle antiquarian prejudice for maintaining things as they are, solely because they have been so ; neither is a generation bound to respect its fore- fathers as wiser and better than itself — for this is true or not, as the case may be, we cannot always tell ; nevertheless, the poet's observation — Et crepat antiquum genus, ut pietate repletum Perfecile angustis tolerant finibus sevum — ^ has ever been a deep-seated, and I may say affec- tionate, feeling of the human breast towards the past; and the most virtuous men of pagan times have ac- 1 Lucretius, lib. i. CH. v.] QUARANTINE — ITS EMPLOYMENTS. 79 knowledged the truth, justice, and beauty of the sen- timent, although they knew not whence it was ob- tained. It belongs to revelation alone to disclose the secret, that man clings with veneration to the past, because in times past God hath spoken by his pro- phets, and in these latter times by his Son. It is remarkable to find an atheist of Rome denying the feeling as an infidel philosopher, and acknowledging it with his better feelings as a poet. Faith, as the evidence of things not seen, realises the past, be- lieves the future; hope rejoices in both; infidelity knows neither the one nor the other, revels and wal- lows only in the present. Religious men are com- monly called prejudiced by worldly men, and consi- derable jest is bestowed upon their notions, as those of superannuated obsolete bigotry. But it will al- ways be found that such sneers fall perfectly harm- less upon religious men themselves, because they know die value of their connexion with the past ; and for what in the infidel's creed would they exchange the hope that is to come ? The first symptom of a progress towards infidelity, whether in the character of the individual or in that of a people, is discern- ible in a growing indifference towards the past ; faith sees and owns the hand of God in the past, out of this springs hope for the future. They that live in the present set up one or other of two idols — them" selves t as wiser than their ancestors ; or if not, pre- sent objects of sense, in lieu of future objects of faith. If this be the animating prospect which the rapid progress of the nineteenth century offers to the vo- taries of its intellectual advancement — if this be the glorious emancipation of science, as distinct from the happiness of religion, 1 can only say, in pity to the victims of so miserable a delusion, that they little know the chains they are hanging around them- 80 A VISIT TO THE EAST. selves ; while they say they are free, they little know the happiness from which they are aliens, and the treacherous phantoms to which they in heart bow down. But to return to the Turkish empire, that has suggested this digression. There will soon be a palpable harvest of the spread of infidelity in the coming fate of this empire. The Egyptian rebel learnt a lesson from European infidelity, and mas- ter and scholar have amply done their work. The ancient dynasty of the sultans learnt the same les- son, learnt it worse; and came within an ace of utter dismemberment, its most loyal subjects see- ing no vent for their loyalty to tlie old national honour and faith, except in the service of their deadliest enemy and disturber. The sequel is a remarkable feature in Europe's present history : in- fidel France, which taught the lesson, stands sul- lenly aloof from the temporary frustration of the full harvest she expected from her doctrines. The four nations of Europe, whose faith is but wavering, interpose to delay the accomplishment of a lesson which they have not failed to applaud, and in some minor degree to promote. England, ever foremost with her hand of power, ever blessed by Provi- dence in her acts, ever tampering with evil in her doctrines, has laid her iron grasp upon rebellion; and there is some comfort in the thought that ailing and infidel as are the times that have set in upon us, the act of English power is, as it has ever been, the instrument in the Almighty's hand, whereby he shews that he yet rules in the kingdoms of men, and maintains the rightful sovereign upon his throne. CHAPTER VI. Startihu into life suddenly, on die chores of Egypt, widiout any other history of the manner of our arrival thither, than an ingenious theorist might draw by conjecture from the date and su- perscription of the baaki of the Nile, you may be tempted to believe, that either we have found a ring of equal powers with that of Aladdin, or else that Bome favoured fisherman must have released us from an enchantment on the sea-shote and quarantine of Jaffa. And yet for some time this shall remain a mystery ; and we will now represent ourselves as a small party, consisting of three Englishmen, a Scots- man, an Irishman, and a Mr. L — a young Israelite, standing on the banks of the Nile, without servant or dragoman, all of us, except Mr. L — , profomidly 82 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ignorant of the language, almost without provision, and with very little of the necessary apparatus which a European must sooner or later find to be indispen- sable on his arrival in the East. We had landed from a little chiaktourf or boat of the country ; our rets (captain), with his two men, was busy in stowing away tlie worn-out cordage and tackle that had brought us over in safety ; and we were holding that ambiguous form of consultation respecting our advance into the country, which companies are apt to do on those emergencies when no one has any very decided or definite knowledge of what to recommend. The first step usual in these cases is, to make known the entire predicament to the consul, or consular agent; and accordingly a polite message was sent to our consular agent, who soon came to us. He proved to be an Arab merchant of the town, speak- ing Italian very fluently. He was kindness itself to us ; and after the first ceremony of presentation was over, which, for the sake of becoming solemnity, transpired with due honours of pipes and coffee in the adjoining divan of the chief of the custom-house, his advice was that we should hire a boat and pro- ceed up the river to Cairo ; accordingly his drago- man was sent with us to inspect all the boats which were either on the point of starting with cargoes, or might be hired for the purpose. In the mean time we had leisure, in some degree, to settle our thoughts respecting the land of Egypt, in which we now found ourselves. We had been three days in a little boat of not more than eight or ten tons burden entirely out of sight of land, one day of which had been a perfect calm until about four o'clock in the evening, and during it the heat of the sun was hardly tolerable. The glossy bril- liant surface and the sickly undulating swell, that seemed to cradle our little craft as it lay almost CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 83 motionless, kept us in the boat in constant motion for the chance of obtaining, behind the sails, a little shelter from the sun, and made us sigh for a breath of air to relieve us from our helplessness. About four o'clock the clouds appeared as if they shewed an inclination to move, and slight ruffles here and there, which sailors term catspaws, indicated a coming breeze : we were now all eagerness to know from what quarter; for we had begun to calculate our stock of water, and found that with extreme economy it would not suffice for more than eight days. At last, after several idle flaps of the little mainsail, a steady breeze came from the northward, which al- lowed us to keep a straight course for Alexandria, and we were able to go to bed with a better heart than we had hitherto done, knowing that we were steadily advancing, at between three and four knots an hour, towards fresh water. I think none of us will soon forget what it is to be exposed without shelter to a Mediterranean sun in an open boat. It was the day but one after this that we first came in sight of the Egyptian coast, a long, low, dark line of land : we had seen on the former day an ap- parent current of muddy water, as if from die Nile, maintaining for some distance towards land a line of distinction between itself and the rest of the sea, which, in spite of the neighbourhood of the coast, was still true to its sea complexion. Our captain had prognosticated our arrival on the Egyptian coast, but still land was not visible, and imtil die morning we were not able to see it. When it did present itself, it was only as a low dark line, very like the coast of Holland, above which, here and there, a solitary palm-tree shewed its plumy foliage. The log of the vessel had been kept so inaccurately, that our navigators were for some time uncertain whether we were to the westward or to the east of Alex- 84 A YISIT TO THE EAST. andria ; we had therefore to coast along under a pleasant breeze for a long time, to discover some sign or mark whereby to ascertain our position. At last they determined that we were to the eastward of, not Alexandria, but Damietta ; and accordingly a council was called to determine whether we should not ascend the Damietta branch of the Nile at once, and give up all thoughts of seeing Alexandria. This seemed the better plan ; and, after some persua- sion, Mr. L — was induced to accompany us. About twelve o'clock we came to the quarantine station ; and I think were unanimous in admiring the pecu- liarly graceful, and yet odd forms of the palm-trees, as they surrounded us, here and there singly stand- ing forth against a deep blue sky, and again in deep clusters, £at had perhaps more the appearance of numbers of single beehives upon their stands, than any thing we see in Europe. We were, however, afterwards destined to find how wearisome uniformity may in the end cause beauty itself to become. What we now so greatly admired for its genuine simple gracefulness, its truly singular eastern character, in a few months wearied and tired the eye, and one then looked in vain for some foliage of a different cha- racter to relieve the dull long line of level country over which these trees were spread, with the painful tactician stiffness of almost military uniformity. After a delay of nearly two hours, the little good-humoured doctor of the quarantine came in answer to a summons sent afler him, and we re- ceived permission to enter the country, or in qua- rantine phrase were admitted into pratique. A brisk breeze soon carried us against the very rapid current which was taking off the remainder of the great yearly inundation, and we landed as we should say at the custom-house stairs, where a singular group of idle people soon gathered to express their CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. S5 indolent astonishment at so unusual a sight as the arrival of six Europeans in their European dress. After a considerable time spent in making an unsatisfactory search for a boat in which to proceed, it was suggested and agreed upon, that we should go up the river with our old crew and boat ; after some bargaining an agreement was made, and we laid in a store of such necessaries as we were able to buy, or rather such as we were able to make use of when bought; for since the culinary department was sadly crippled, both from the ignorance and in- aptitude of its professors, and from entire lack of the means of exhibiting our proficiency, had we been possessed of any, it will easily be imagined that our diet both had been, and would continue to be, of the simplest kind ; and that if we did hereafter carry away with us from the country any vivid recollec- tions of the flesh-pots of Egypt, this would be rather owing to the strong power of pre-existing tradition rising into substance from the visible presence of the country, than from any practical acquaintance which we had either hitherto obtained, or were likely to do for the future. All our arrangements were now made, and about the evening of the same day when we were prepared to start, the command was given and insisted upon against the strong remonstrance of the reis, who said there was no wind. He proved to be right ; and all we gained was, that we were drifted down consider- ably below our first position, before, by the use of the oars, we were able to gain the opposite bank. The same night we suffered so much from mosqui- toes, that we had no difficulty in comprehending the necessity for those precautions which Herodotus relates to have been taken against them by most of the inhabitants of the marshes. After all, our reis at last turned faint-hearted at the idea of the unseen 86 A VISIT TO THE EAST. dangers of the ascent ; and as the consul also strongly dissuaded us from venturing with so small a crew, so little acquainted with the method of river-navi- gation, we released him from his engagement, and started the same day in possession of the cabin of a large boat laden with salt and wood ; 200 piastres being the sum agreed upon. About four o'clock in the evening we loosed from the banks of tlie Damietta custom-house, and slowly stemmed the current, with a moderate breeze, which in two hours' time entirely failed. The first view of an Egyptian town and popu- lation leaves a European so puzzled, that he is quite at a loss what to think, — there is scarcely any one thing by which he can identify to himself that what he sees is really human ; for the language, the houses, the dresses of the people, the very con- tents of the bazaars, all betoken a mode of life so different even from the Turkish capital, not to men- tion Europe, that one seems for a time as if among a new race of beings, not of Adam's lineage, and in the midst of some different life. Perhaps it may be one of the great charms, I have often since thought so, of eastern travelhng, that it brings the traveller perpetually in contact with totally different speci- mens of life, existing, so to speak, within each other, and yet remaining virtually distinct, and to all human judgment destined to await unchanged the final des- tinies of this earth. Uniformity is invariably found to be wearisome ; and within the last fifty years one may almost say that variety has been disappearing from the heart of European society. The nations of Europe have of late years, since the French revo- lution, borrowed and interchanged so many of their practices, principles, tones of thought, expressions, and even common customs — they have approached to each other so much by the adoption of a common CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 87 Standard, taken chieBy from the French, that dis- tinct national identity is fast becoming lost — all of which is quite miknown to the people of the East. I apprehend it is this variety, and the marked he- reditary unmixed character, every wrhere distinctly observable, which so amply atones for the entire want of that beauty, order, and cleanliness which in Europe wearies from its very monotony. Damietta very much resembles some parts of Venice on the grand canal, even in the character of tlie houses ; and but that we were so wishful to lose no time in obtaining a sight of Cairo, I believe we all of us left the town with regret, owing to the exceeding kind- ness of our consul, who pressed us to partake of the hospitality of his house ; an offer we were compelled to decline, partly from anxiety to avoid any longer delay, and partly on account of the scanty state of our wardrobes. We were now fairly embarked, together with our two Arab friends. They had accompanied us from Jaffa in the chiaktour, and had asked and obtained leave to take their passage with us. One of them, who proved of great use to us, had been dragoman in the service of some European in Syria, and was re- turning on account of ill health. They posted them- selves on the roof of the cabin : as for our own party, the first question raised was, how to dispose of the two cabins which belonged to us. In the first, which was a tolerably spacious one, there was found to be room for five to spread their carpets; each person allotting to himself a certain portion of the area of the cabin floor, on which to sit cross-legged during the daytime and to sleep at night ; a little territory sacred to his books, his carpet, and such otlier parts of his establishment as he might think proper to have about him. The sixth of our party accepted the entire possession of the inner cabin, a privilege 88 A VISIT TO THE EAST. annexed to the office of steward, which he had kindly undertaken ; accordingly he lived among the stores and implements of his vocation ; and to him an appeal is invariably made in every thing relat- ing to the provision-department. Indeed, I question whether ever steward found so uniformly obedient and obsequious a company to rule over. One has a happy taste for cooking, as he himself says only from necessity ; but we are willing to accept this as modesty on his part, and are too glad to bestow the cheap reward of our general satisfaction and praise, and on fitting occasions, our substantial testimony how justly we appreciate his skill. If we do not fare in a princely manner, it is not for want of mate- rials, for each day does but more and more convince us, that this is truly the land of abundance. The water has some weeks ago retired from the fields, and all is green and preparing for another harvest. We send one of the sailors out every morning for milk, and obtain nearly a gallon for a piaster (two- pence), and our other provisions at the same scale of price, a fowl for three-halfpence. We have now been about five days ascending, and we are still some distance firom Cairo, and very uncertain when we may reach it. Still the climate is so pleasant, the air so dry, that you may imagine how agreeable our voyage has been, seated on the wood cargo watching die hr^ fellahs at their work in the fields, with their strange uncouth implements, sometimes ploughing, sometimes threshing out the year's harvest with a couple of oxen yoked to a curious kind of wood-frame, the wheels of which appear to do the work of threshing, by treading out the com. Now and then a harsh bittern-like creak- ing drew our attention to a couple of bullocks going slowly and patiently round a rude wooden frame, which turned a kind of waterwheel ; the tolerably CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 89 abundant stream of water discharged by it, conducted by means of a little channel, compacted together from the soft soil, to several hundred yards distance from the river, for some crop which requires this care. Then again the number of low dingy vil- lages scattered up and down over the plain, each forming a distinct group of houses, and, rising from the midst, the tall, slender and really beautiful min- aret of the mosque, without indeed the unrivalled elegance of the Turkish spiral form, and yet breath- ing the very soul of original Eastern design. It is quite true that the houses are ugly, low, square, rooBess buildings, often constructed with unbaked mud bricks, and their population exhibit no one sign of what we in Europe could call either com- fort or even cleanliness ; and yet when one cannot help observing the evident dignity which the mosque maintains, and the spontaneous reverence which is paid towards it and to all its sacred precincts and ministers, I can never believe that such a popula- tion, however deficient in what we term the arts of life, and apparently ignorant of grammar and polite literature, are so much in need of the pity which we might be apt to bestow upon them. It is true that God has given them a knowledge of nothing more than the spurious Mahometan reve- lation ; and until it shall please him to make known to them his purer truth, at his own good time, I must ever acknowledge that it is a pleasing, a most pleasing sight, to see any people shewing such visi- ble marks of the truest and profoundesc veneration for the majesty of God, which the poor despised Mahometan Egyptian really does. I can only say, I would I had now a recollection of a Christian church drawing forth from the hearts of its people but a portion of the true and deep reverence which the Mahometan every where exhibits towards his i2 90 A VISIT TO THE BAST. mosque. The Mahometan is clearly in possession of one practical truth in which Christian multitudes, with all their pretensions, are sadly found wanting, I mean, ** the fear of God, which is the beginning of wisdom." Time certainly passed very pleasantly. The river itself was a source of constant variety in the differ- ent boats, with their crews and passengers, as we kept meeting them floating down the stream with export cargoes. One can form no idea of the labour which an accidental meeting of a party of acquaint- ances of this kind, entails upon all : no sooner is a boat in sight, the owner or crew of which is known, or even if they are perfect strangers it does not much matter, than the proper series of salutations, com- pliments and inquiries begins, and lasts without any interruption until distance absolutely intercepts the possibility of hearing any thing more. Mr. L — trans- lated the substance of sdl that passed, for me, once or twice ; and it was not a little remarkable, that on no one occasion was a question either put or an- swered such as an English man of business would have thought of asking his friend ; mere compli- ments, more extravagant than the politest native of France ever paid to a young lady on her first entree dans le grand monde. Two little circumstances I think I must relate, — they amused us exceedingly, and though trifling in themselves, as you may perhaps think, I am inclined to be of opinion, that the true genius of a people lies much more under such trifles than we are apt to suspect. It was generally supposed, I remember, when I left England, that one of those beautiful instances of the spread of science, which it is the peculiar glory of this age to witness, had bloomed and budded into the choicest specimen of fruit which the history of CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 91 past ages could display, in the so-called political r^eneration of Egypt, under the wise administration of its present pasha, Mohammed Ali. I shall not now dispute the truth of this. To what classes, however, within the pashalic, the new organic in- fluence does not extend, may be guessed from the trifling incident I am about to relate : — The captain of our boat is evidently a grumbling, ill-tempered man, whom nothing but his regard for the 200 piastres we have agreed to pay, has induced to submit to the society of Franks. He sits all the day leaning against one particular rope, cross-legged, and seldom if ever speaks more than is absolutely necessary to his crew. We are unanimous in re- quiring a large supply of milk every morning for break^t ; and as the milk of the country is made into curds almost immediately, it becomes necessary to send in quest of it very early in the morning. The captain being very little able to understand how we came to make so great a point of obtaining our sup- ply, on the third morning flatly refused to send one of his men. This was so open an act of rebellion, that for some time we were in no little consternation how we were to manage him for the rest of the jour- ney, especially as we had no interpreter upon whom we could depend for a full and adequate communi- cation of our indignation towards him. About ten o'clock we came to the town of Mansourah, the seat of a bey. We landed, and strayed about the town, making several little purchases which we knew would be wanted. As Mr. B and myself were puzzling our way back to our vessel, we stumbled accidentally upon the dragoman of Abdul Hamed, the bey, who, seeing we were Europeans, and per- haps claiming a kind of western kindred, being him- self a European, accosted us, and very politely in- quired whedier it was our pleasure to visit the bey. 92 A VISIT TO THE EAST. We excused ourselves at first, on the plea of being too roughly dressed, and a rough dress certainly we each of us had on, wherein to pay a visit of cere- mony to a dignity second in rank to the pasha him- self. However his dragoman assured us that we might be perfectly at ease. Accordingly we suffered ourselves to be conducted along a street or two, when we came to a nice garden, very neatly laid out with many small shrubs and flowers, none of which, being but a poor florist, was I able to re- cognise. At last we came into a large ante-room, where was assembled a large miscellaneous crowd of dependents, and diflerent persons waiting for au- dience or possibly for justice ; after remaining here for a short time, that the announcement of our being come might take eflect, we were ushered into the hall of audience, and found the bey in full divan. I should hardly forget to mention, our coats and shoes were both in holes ; and yet, notwithstanding, our reception was most gracious. We were made to sit down by the side of his excellency close to him, and he commenced a discourse concerning the latest news from the head-quarters of Ibrahim's army, the countries we had passed through, and many other such matters ; amongst others, the pro- ject of navigating the Nile by steam, and the suc- cess of the pasha's attempt. Pipes were now served round with most splendid moutlipieces of amber, set with diamonds, together with coffee; and B observing the bey*s eye to be inflamed, asked him about it. I ventured to recommend a lotion with a little warm milk and water; a simple remedy, which they seemed to despise from its very simpli- city. B however, going much more nobly to work, rose from his seat and to my great astonish- ment took hold of the bey*s hand, felt his pulse, looked grave, asked his patient several questions* CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 93 with the most perfect medical propriety, and con- cluded by saying how much he regretted not having more medicines with him than he had brought on this journey ; but that if the bey would trust to him, he would send him some pills that he had no doubt would do him a great deal of service. The bey grate^lly and with perfect submission accepted the ofler, and accordingly the dragoman was directed to accompany us to the boat, in order to bring away the medicinal treasure. On our way home we were taken to see Mohammed Ali's new palace, the de- sign of which was said to be, I cannot tell how justly, from his own hands. I will not say more of this now than that it was pretty and tasteful, and yet not free from painted decorations and curtains of the most tawdry and outrageous description. As we pursued our way to the boat, we took occasion to inform the dragoman quietly respecting the re- bellious conduct of the captain, and requested him to give him a few intimations from head-quarters, as to the ultimate issue of such incivility towards the intimate friends of his highness the bey, if they should have any further occasion to complain ; and forthwith I was commissioned to pack up a dozen common pills in a packet of writing-paper, tied up with a little brownish thread, and labelled in Eng- lish, for the sake of a more mysterious appearance ; and when this was done, we parted with our friend the dragoman with mutual obeisances, but from that time we had not one word of complaint against the captain. The dragoman's words had taken deep root, and though he remained as surly as ever, complais- ance and obedience to our wishes was from hence- forth the rule of his conduct. All this was the result of an alliance made by the means of a dozen anti- bilious pills with a powerful bey, high in the favour of the well-known and dreaded sovereign of this 94 A VISIT TO THE EAST. rising and regenerated empire of the East. By this simple means, had our captain but known it, we received nothing but compliance and submission from a man strongly disposed to manifest every symptom of a bad temper, and at whose mercy we must otherwise have been for the remainder of our journey. The other little circumstance you will say is indeed trifling, but I am not dispose4 to think it so, for it was the only instance of spirit, in the case of a native, which we have seen during the whole of our stay in Egypt. As we were straying up and down the town of Mansourah, J came, with one of the party, to an open space or market-place, where, among other commodities of market produce, quantities of onions lay tastily disposed in little square pyrami- dical heaps. We asked the price of one of them, and our friend the onion-merchant, observing that we knew almost nothing of the language, thought it a very fair opportunity to obtain an excellent sale, and accordingly asked a most extravagant price. Against this we remonstrated in the best way we could for some time; but finding the man inexorable, my companion, partly in joke, took up an onion, and, in a sort of threatening attitude, suitable to one of Homer's heroes about to hurl a stone such as twelve men of these degenerate days could not lift, onion in hand he signified his great disapprobation of the man's conduct. This was too much for even Egyp- tian forbearance, and the man, who was sitting cross- legged, no sooner saw it, than he rose instantly with another onion in his hand, in a corresponding atti- tude ; the two figures being together no unfair repre- sentation of the approach of Glaucus and Diomede. A parley ensued, when the onions were laid aside, and we took our leave of the man with an obeisance. But this is the only incident in which, during six CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 95 months' stay in the country, I remember to have seen an Egyptian shew, any symptom of a little in- dependence of spirit. In this sort of manner we spent eight days in the passage to Cairo very pleasantly : it was to have been wished that we had come better prepared into the comitry, with a few books relating to its history and productions ; for though Egypt is in a manner an elementary part of juvenile geography and history, it is surprising how indefinite the knowledge so ac- quired proves, when it comes into contact with the actual country, and the real vital fact of a living po- pulation is present before the eyes. I have not men- tioned one curious feature of the scene, the number of pigeon houses, of much the same shape with the glass furnaces of Europe, studded with innumerable little holes, like immense rough sponges ; in some instances one might fairly question whether a village was more entitled to be considered the abode of pigeons or of man ; one would think that the depre- dations they commit would far exceed their value ; but perhaps the inhabitants find it better to have them tame and in their possession, and so to draw some sort of advantage from them, than to suffer the same depredation, which they inevitably would do, from them as wild birds, taking refuge and making their head-quarters in the hills of the desert. The im- mense destructive flocks of these birds in Upper Egypt are almost incredible. The evening of the seventh day came, finding us still very far from Cairo, and we were upon the point of making a bargain for the use of a little boat, to be towed up against the current, in the hope' of reaching Cairo late in the following evening, when happily the discomforts of spending the night in so cramped a position deterred us, and the following morning set in with a brisk breeze from the north, 96 A VISIT TO THE EAST. that carried our boat gaily along with the sails out- spread before it, or as sailors say, " goose- winged." The river presented a really beautiful sight as we neared Cairo, the tips of the Pyramids rising in view more and more each half hour, with all the crowd of recollections buried in past times connected with them. By and by we passed the branch of the Nile which divides and turns off to Rosetta, when the Pyramids rose in full view before us ; and it must be confessed, that they give rise to some curious and hardly definable feelings ; they are giants, and as it were the very image of permanence and solidity ; and they seem as if they were there, to bear tes- timony to man that generations of his own species had been on the eardi before him ; that he is come forth, whence he knows not, that he is going, whi- ther he knows not ; that they could inform him if they would, of times, manners, people, worship, practices, thoughts, customs, ways of life, tales of happiness and misery, of domestic incidents, and all the simple little charms of human life, such as they still remain, mingled with the cruelties of power and dominion, such as we have unhappily always known them to be ; only there they stand pointing to heaven — three dull immovable, inanimate, rectilinear masses — a weak insect attempt of man to rival the works of Him in whose ** hand are all the comers of the earth, and the strength of the hills is his also.*' They seem as if they had locked up within themselves the secrets of past times ; and yet their very look strikes one with a conviction that they will not reveal it. The river now presents a very animated scene : numbers of different sized boats, some with parties of the country people going towards the great town, others returning from it ; different little trading ves- sels with agricultural and other produce ; and as we approached the town, groups of trees of different foli- CH. VI.] BANKS OF TKE NILE. 97 ages ; a busy, gay population on the banks ; and every where, as we pass, the complimentary Arab greetings of the different boats, the ceremonious sa- laams, continued until extreme distance must sadly diminish the proper effect which they could not otherwise fail of having. By and by, the palace of Schoubra, with its avenue of trees close to the river; and then further on, comes the unhappy contrast of a factory with a long ugly Lancashire chimney, and, in the distance, the Mokattam range of rocks, with the citadel where the Mamlukes were slain, studded with tall beautiful Oriental minarets, rising from the midst of clusters of houses ; and at last, after passing rapidly by a number of interesting objects, of which we had barely time to form an idea, we land at Boulaq, at the custom-house wharf, among even a more busy and strange population than we had found at Damietta. I shall in vain attempt to give you any fair idea of the scene which ensued. The donkey boys of Cairo are pretty well known, now that this town has become a stage on the great European route to India ; and amongst the first to welcome the Franks were numbers of these little urchins, many of them with only one eye, industriously recommending their don- keys. The crew clamouring for bacshish, the cap- tain for his pay, the porters packing the luggage on camels, the custom-house people demanding fees to which they had no right, a motley crowd of men and women looking on, here and there among the crowd a miserable decrepit beggar, and again, a few vener* able grave old men, whose turbans of peculiar shape, and long silvery beards, intimated either the dignified and reserved Turk from some part of the Levant, or the Egyptian oolema ; another, of a dark tawny sinister face, would be a Copt clerk, or subordinate officer of the custom-house. The whole scene was K 98 A VISIT TO THE EAST. SO Strange, that we were glad to be able to drive off at last upon the saddled donkeys which had been so industriously proffered to us, and to take leave of our river dwelling. As I rode up with Mr. L — , I cannot help mentioning a curious circumstance, that just as we were entering the gate of the town, we met with two donkey boys, apparently on their way to Boulaq ; they had been quarrelling violently, and as is pretty much the case in every country, the younger one had been very greatly bullied by the senior and stronger : as soon as his persecutor was at a sufficient distance to prevent the likelihood of his returning, and when his sobbing and rage would permit him, we heard him, as we passed, cry out at the top of his voice — Yahoodi, Yahoodi ! " There," said Mr. L — , " he calls him a Jew; that is the worst thing he could call him next to a pig." Such is the estimation in which the Mahometans appear to hold the Jews. Soon after this we found ourselves in the midst of the town, and were threading our way through narrow streets, crowded with the most singular population, to an hotel instituted by Mr. Waghom, where we were once more received under the protection of European cus- toms and comforts. The next morning we were all in motion to see something of the city, I confess for my own part with no little curiosity; for the gloom of the preced- ing evening had shewed in the dim light by which we had entered, the strange Moorish archways of different buildings, the richly variegated lattice-work of the window-shutters. The narrow streets, with the singular population which crowded them, had called up so vividly all the early recollections which had been learnt in childhood from the fables and tales of the East, and every thing seemed to bid so fair a promise of distinctly realising all the floating CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 99 visions which the remembrance of Mirza, or the Caliphs of the Arabian Nights, had left, that we were very eager to enter the town, and were quite glad when the last of the party signified his readiness to quit our European quarters. I have now so much before me, which has been so often and so much better said by other describers of this strangest of towns, that I shall take, with your permission, a different method from attempting to give my own account, and refer you to the work of Mr. William Lane for the most minute research which perhaps any traveller has made for centuries past into the manners and customs of a people. Mr. William Lane, Sir G. Wilkinson, and Mr. R. Hay, are those of our own countrymen who are most distinguished for tlieir discoveries and inquiries into the state of Egypt present and past. To trespass upon what they have found inexhaustible is an at- tempt which I am sure you will not require from me, and it would be extreme presumption in one whose stay in the country was comparatively so short, and whose knowledge of the language so very imperfect, to attempt to treat of matters, some of which still await their future and more mature inquiry. We will therefore, if you please, change the scene to Alexandria, where, after ten days* stay in Cairo, and a three days* journey, first by the Rosetta branch of the Nile, and then by the canal of thirty miles' length, which- the present pasha has made, we ar- rived perfectly safe, having found little or no discer- nible difference in the general aspect of the western and eastern sides of the Delta. The approach to Alexandria by the Mahmoudieh canal is exceedingly tame, and there was little of in* terest connected with the town in its present con- dition ; it had lately suffered exceedingly from the plague. Dirt, filth, and misery strongly marked both 100 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the population and their dwellings, until we came to the European quarter, where we were at once sur- prised by the sight of a well-formed open place, sur- rounded on all sides by European merchants' houses, where, intermingled with the red Egyptian turban, the bonnet of Europe together with hats and black coats might be seen, as the respective wearers strolled about enjoying the cool of the evening. Our first care was to prepare for a return to Europe, and if possible to obtain an interview with the pasha before quitting the country. It was the season of the fast of the Ramadan, and no public business is suffered to be transacted until after sun- set. This caused the hours of evening to be entirely occupied with hearing and receiving intelligence from the different officers of the government, and the con- sul appeared unable to present us in form. Owing to Mr. Waghorn*s kindness, we were received as his friends ; and I shall long remember our interview. At about half-past six we came to the palace to wait the sunset, wbich is the signal for prayers to begin. As I had been selected to act as mediator between Atyn Bey the French interpreter and our kind in- troducer Mr. Waghorn, we walked up the palace stairs in time to witness the public prayers, which during this month are the prelude to business. No- thing could, in all appearance, be more devout and reverential, the pasha himself appearing to join with due solemnity. When these were over, we entered a handsome room surrounded with a lofty crimson velvet divan, exhibiting in its decorations the pe- culiar taste of the East, in which though the sepa- rate execution of the several parts was indifferent, yet the whole presented a pleasing appearance. We were introduced ; and Mr. Waghorn was asked to sit beside the pasha, who retired to a corner of the divan, and began questioning him respecting the CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 101 events that the interval between the last mails had brought to pass in Europe. The complete command which he appears to have over his features did not allow the smallest anxiety to be apparent ; although, during the time of our visit, the events that have since happened in 1840, were doubtless to his per- fect knowledge, preparing in the diplomatic conclaves of Europe, and European intelligence must therefore have been to him of extreme importance : still an apparently easy conversation ensued, which passed first into French, and subsequently into Turkish from his interpreter, chiefly relating to the various little incidents of newspaper intelligence that had come to pass. Amongst other things, said Mr. Wag- horn, tell his highness 1 read in a book lately, that himself. Napoleon, and the Duke of Wellington, were born in the same day. The pasha received the intelligence with a slight inclination, and replied by some indifferent question. We were now dis- turbed by the entry of some message that took the pasha*s attention, and in a little while, at the re- quest of the interpreter, who informed him that se- veral friends of Mr. Waghom were remaining out- side the palace, very desirous of the honour of an interview, he graciously asked them all to enter* The whole party were accordingly introduced in due form, and his highness retired to his corner, where he receives all strangers. The conversation turned chiefly on a few points of comparison between his own dominions and those of the sultan ; of the extreme civility of all his oflicers to Europeans ; of the great safety of travelling under the protection of his name. When this last observation was made to him he replied, " Some years ago, one of your coun- trymen, un grand milord, expressed to me a wish to visit the Pyramids ; I was obliged to send with him an escort of 300 soldiers well mounted, — now ladies k2 102 A VISIT TO THE EAST. may, if they please, go up alone." Throughout the whole interview his replies were in general of the short, sententious and apothegmatic form, that one would imagine suitable in the mouth of a dignified eastern sovereign; and we could not but feel the charm of a simplicity and dignity upon which it was impossible to intrude, and which was apparently maintained without so much as the consciousness of an effort. We took our leave exceedingly gratified at thus having seen and spoken with a man, whose name is stamped upon the history of his times as having done more to bring the manners, customs and religion of the East in contact with the West than any eastern potentate before him. He has been often described, and it might seem a mere re- petition to add my own impression ; still accounts of him are so widely different, that there is room for an additional one, where so little opportunity of judging has existed in the short glimpse that a passing interview affords. I think it must be impos- sible not to be struck with his masterly composure of manner, voice, look, gesture, and eye ; and I would even hope, that one who has gone dirough scenes of such tortuous and precarious adventure, and has acted a part in them of which history must judge, — and let it be remarked, that we understand next to nothing of the principles pre-existing in the field of eastern ambition, — has had time to make amends for the act of his early career, by wielding his acquired power with something of the firmness and impartial jus- tice which is the only real glory of either sovereign or subject. The character of Mohammed All is a mixed one ; it ill becomes those who have been in- debted to him for countenance and protection to say any thing in detraction of his private character, they need not on that account be supposed to extenuate the cruel acts through which he waded to his power. CH. VI.] BANKS OF THE NILE. 103 or justif)^ a rebellion against his lawful master ; they are not called upon to judge; and I, for my own part, can never forget the debt I owe personally to one yrhose Jirman ensured me civility and hospitality wherever I went, without, however, implying the smallest approbation of the course which enabled him to bestow it ; but more of him by and by. There remained one other object of curiosity in Alexandria to be visited, the combined Turkish and Egyptian fleet ; they had been anchored in the harbour in such a manner that each Turkish ship lay opposite to an Egyptian one ; and the cautious pasha, fearing the ficlde character of Turkish crews, had removed all ammunition from the Turkish ships, and so placed them, that in the event of an insur- rection, each Turkish ship might be at the mercy of its neighbour. Now you can hardly conceive a finer naval display, for the harbour was crowded with all imaginable smaller fry, that shewed the great Leviathans of war in their full proportions. We went on board the Mahmoudieh, built in the reign of the late sultan, an 140-gun ship ; it seemed as if we were coming under a wooden cliff* as our boat neared the narrow steps by which we mounted up the sides of the giant ; on her lower deck we were civilly accosted by an officer, and taken all over the ship. As I have no nautical eye I shall not pretend to say any thing, except that all seemed in beautiful order, although the sailors were certainly sitting cross-legged in many parts of the vessel, which, even to a landsman, has an unnautical ap- pearance. Great cleanliness and general smartness appeared to exist amongst them. From the Turkish we went to the Egyptian flag -ship, and there found the same civil and polite reception, but a totally different order of things, — a much taller, heavier, unseamanlike sort of crew, newer guns, more neat- 104 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ness, and I confess with more apparent diiicipline, 1 think that the Turks looked more like seamen, and that the victory would have been theirs, had an en- gagement taken place; that is, judging from the ge- neral tone of the tvo crews with tlieir officers. One is quite puzzled at the change that has come over hoth the Turks and Arabs. When Belzoni was in search of antiquities, he was severely wounded out of pure wantonness by an Egyptian soldier. We, a party of Europeans, without any other introduction than our European character, coming alongside in a hired boat, were received with perhaps more distinc- tion than heretofore a real dignitary of any European nation would have met with. It seems as if Europe held the balance of that which the two people were contending for, and that eagerness to gain an advan- tage over each other had cast a momentary gleam on the European character, which remains as odious to their true feeling, and as real an abomination to them, as it ever has been. CHAPTER VII. There is a fatality attendant upon all my attempts to keep a full journal of our movementa, which even now, after some considerable interval and a little quiet leisure, does not cease to haunt me. But so it is. However I must not forget that I am in your debt for a very kind letter at Vienna, and you ought to have no reason to accuse me of ingratitude in not endeavouring to make some return. And yet were you in my place, I do not think you could have done otherwise. Whenever 106 A VISIT TO THE EAST. you do make the experiment of the time it re- quires to look with a familiar eye upon the ways and customs, dresses and people of the East, you will pardon me, my cautious abstinence from prematurely attempting a description that could not have failed to be defective, erroneous, unsatisfactory, and pos- sibly even unintelligible. One or two of these at- tempts have already been torn up ; and I have the greatest reason to be exceedingly afraid, lest, with all my humble professions of ignorance, inadequate means and time for inquiry, you will still require nothing short of an ample account of Egypt, its an- tiquities, its present condition, its pasha, in short a full and just account of Egypt under every point of view which it presents ; although these are more numerous than any other country besides can claim. And now I am suffering under a dilemma of which you are the cause ; with a great deal before me, a very inquisitive critical auditor, ready to digest every thought, and all my humility insufficient to protect me. Whichever way one turns, there is the same difficulty; for no one topic is inadequate to a vo- lume ; how little then is an entry in a diary equal to the whole ! But preface and humility aside, I am now writing after a return from a visit to the second cataracts of Wadi Haifa ; and a little plain narrative is perhaps better than all apology. I shall not, then, delay you with an account of our boat, our bargain, our crew, or our captain : suffice it to say, we found them as they are generally repre- sented, the boat new, clean, and very comfortable, the crew and captain civil and obliging, but apt to presume, unless kept under subjection; and perhaps no party ever left Cairo with a fairer future in view, and few I may venture to say have more truly en- joyed their trip. It is an odd thing to me that so many persons should collect together from all parts of the CH. VII.] THE NILE. 107 world for the sake of this journey, — idlers, and East Indian passengers, learned and unlearned antiqua- rians, and despisers of antiquity, — for there is nothing particularly amusing in Egypt. In the first place, the very language of the people, which is inaccessible, is an effectual barrier to much amusement; and certainly no one can say that there is any thing very enlivening in the solid, sober, queer, massive aspect of an Egyp- tian ruin ; or in the dingy, musty, dim interior of an Egyptian tomb ; or in the low dusty passages of the entrance to a pyramid ; or in the interminable multi- tude of grotesque and oddly matched sculptures ; or in the uniform fiat muddy banks of the river ; or in the harmonious " Eli'sah, eli'sah/' of the boatmen tow- ing ; or in the formal pedantry of the palm-trees ; or in the hard labours of the poor farming population, or in their still poorer habitations* And yet withal, not only are all varieties of temper, pursuit, profes- sion, age, and rank drawn towards the ruins of Egypt, but all seemed to be highly satisfied ; and many, which is going a great way for Englishmen, are even not afraid to proclaim their satisfaction. Indeed, there is great danger of the Nile becoming as fa- shionable a tour as the Rhine ; and in that case, woe betide the old ruins. Ten years of polite admiration will destroy and remove more than ten centuries of wild Arab molestation. I see in all this a favourite maxim more and more brought out ; we are pleased to be able to get away from ourselves and from our own times, and to shake ourselves for a while free fi'om our own littlenesses, from the mental atmo- sphere of newspapers, politics, and dissensions, to breathe an air in every way pure, and to enjoy a tran- quillity that can, 1 am sure, hereafter never be for- gotten. And, indeed, have we not in this country the remains of the first known civilisation of the world, the substantial traces of a religious worship many 108 A VISIT TO THE EAST. years anterior to the Jupiters and A polios of the Greeks ? Here we can go to a tomb, and find pic- tures as fresh as the day they were painted, exhibit- ing, in the most easy familiar manner, the domestic life of the former inhabitants ; M. Champollion and Sir G. Wilkinson have shewn us how accurate an account may be gleaned from them of the genius of the people who made them. To be carried back in a manner so artless, and so little antiquarian, to the ear- liest times of the known world, and really to find the remains of an ancient kingdom of many different dy- nasties, and numerous bits as it were of the private life of those times, very little changed by the lapse of centuries, unmolested by antiquarian arrangements, and free from the savour of the museum, — this I con- fess to be a noble change from common pursuits, and to be as a whole more instructive than most of those objects which engage the attention, not only of the scientific, the historian, or the academician traveller, but of the more simple individual whose only pecu- liarity consists in his having left home on the faith of Shakspeare's maxim, " That little experience grows there." We were unfortunate in not bringing from Europe a selection of those works which have of late thrown so much light upon the hieroglyphical cipher; but happily our deficiency was more than supplied by meeting with several very intelligent and kind com- panions ; indeed I may say some profound hierogly- phic scholars. The subject is an interesting one, as opening a field of inquiry but little known, and as yet but little rewarded. There have been a thou- sand scientific absurdities that have had their day as theories ; and one happy result of the improved knowledge in the hieroglyphical cipher is, that all those that related to Egypt are now quite removed. One is certainly at first a little puzzled by the assur- CH. VII.] THE NILE. 109 ance with which the antiquarian resolutely speaks of certain uncouth figures on the walls, as Thothmes, Rameses, &c. But by and by the subject becomes natural ; the features of the old figures grow fami- liar; one seems to recognise an old friend, and to greet him kindly on finding his effigy in a fresh temple. Thothmes and Rameses are no longer mys- teries, but acquaintances ; and on falling now and then into the society of zealous antiquaries, and lis- tening to their eager discourse, the difficulty is, to feel any sort of mistrust that the times of the Pha- raohs are not the reality, and the dynasty of the Sul- tans, with the reign of the pasha, either a past or an anticipated delusion. On the whole, I can hardly imagine a more de- lightful journey. The climate is beyond all praise. We have sat basking in a warm sun, while you have been starved or snowed up at home. No rain, always a variegated blue sky, seldom too hot. Linen washed is dry in three hours. A good deal of game on the banks, partridges, hares, the wild or rock-pigeon, and a bird very much resembling the quail, or partridge of the desert (I believe, the gatii, or quail of the wil- derness), and lastly gazelles. But these never came into the list of our slain. The native method of cap- turing them is quite one of ambuscade. A ravine is chosen where the tracks of the animal shew that they frequent this way from the sands down to the river, in which a wary marksman puts himself in a convenient hiding, where he must sleep until about two in the morning; these animals then generally come to the river-side for water, and at the earliest break of dawn return by the same track to the desert ; it is then the hunter must be awake and alert, for the slightest noise is sufficient to scare them, and sel- dom more than one or two shots can be obtained. This Bedouin fashion, I confess, had no charms 110 A VISIT TO THE EAST. for me; and if asked about it, a ready answer in general was, to wonder at the barbarity of wishing to harm such elegant creatures. Not that I have not very often taken my gun with a charge of ball, on the men*s report of being likely to find them ; but it is only very seldom that they are seen by daylight. In general they return during daytime to tlie heart of die desert. Now and then a crocodile asleep on the bank is too tempting an object to resist, for when the ball strikes the sand close to him, his hasty unwieldy movements to retire to his own ele- ment are no little amusing ; but there is great cruelty in this, for except the ball strikes the eye or brain, the poor animal is but wounded, he drops into the water and is lost. I am glad I never succeeded in hitting one, but I am sorry to say this was more from want of marksmanship than intention. The river is full of fish, and some evidently highly curi- ous, in fact very different from the fish we know ; and had the old ruins allowed me more time, I think I should have tempted some few to their destruc- tion : I did once try to tempt them with all kinds of flies, but this southern minded creation despised them all. I hardly remember to have seen a fish rise at the natural fly in any part of the Nile ; but I am told that they do. Ah amateur artist has no time for other experiments, still I would counsel any future explorer to bring his lines, &c. with him. There are numbers of geese and wild fowl that frequent the river; but a little boat is necessary for any sportsman who is at all keen in his pursuit afber them. They in- habit the rocks and the different shallows where the large boat could not come, or, if it could, would put them all to flight. A place called Djebel el Teyr might be the head-quarters of birds for the whole of Africa ; it was perfectly alive with geese, ducks, cranes, vul- tures, owls, pigeons, pelicans, and every kind of bird; CU. VII.] THE NILE. Ill but above all let curiosity never reach the length of tasting a pelican, if it should be the fortune of any future voyager to shoot one. J happened accidentally to kill one with a random shot, and as we had un- luckily just before found an extract from Belzoni saying that it resembled mutton when roasted, we determined upon trying the experiment. Accord- ingly, when the morning had been almost spent in preparing the skin for stuffing, and after all was finished, a certain portion was reserved for our cook : but let all experimentalists take warning ! The scenery of the banks of the Nile is certainly peculiar. It has been complained of as monotonous^ and has been extravagantly admired ; and it is per- haps impossible to refuse some assent to both opin- ions. There are those who would find fault with the garden of Eden, and there are others who would see something to praise in a field of thistles. I have heard it said that as for Egyptian scenery, take a pencil, rule a line, and make a few short upright marks for palm-trees, and that will be an Egyptian landscape. And even such a landscape, with an Egyptian climate and an Egyptian sky, may chal- lenge a comparison with much that is in Europe* But when the valley narrows itself, and the rocks which bound the valley approach the river, as at El Teyr, El Haridi, El Silsili, and particularly in Nubia, then tlie apology for general want of distinctive fea- ture is complete. 1 confess, however, I must allow the tedious character of the palm-groves ; the eye is really pained by the sight of so many sharp pointed leaves, it amounts to ocular impalement ! In Nubia the valley very seldom exceeds a mile in breadth, and the cultivated portion is little more than the mere bank itself; but there is a far more marked character about the country than in Egypt. It seems as if the river thought itself in danger. 112 A VISIT TO THE £AST. coming from cultivated and flourishing green coun- tries, and being alarmed at such apparently endless tracts of rock and sand, contracted itself therefore into the narrowest compass, as different insects are observed to do on the approach of danger, or like the garrison of a city whose last hope of escape is through the camp of the enemy, knit themselves closely and firmly together to force a passage. On the whole one wonders at the general contentment of all who have seen the Nile, which other spots of far more attractive pretensions are not able to elicit. I suppose the secret is in the delightful climate and healthy air, which goes further than outward beauty to put its spectators in light spirits and good humour with themselves. The remembrance of Egypt as an ancient coun- try leaves so strange a feeling behind, that one is somewhat puzzled how to give an account of the general character of its ancient ruins. I am not one of those that think a ruin venerable only for the number of years which it has survived, nor do I pre- tend to discern, as Falstaff knew the true prince by instinct, the true ancient genius stamped by priority of time upon human works. It must be acknow- ledged that the subdued feeling of mingled awe and wonder which involuntarily steals over the spec- tator who stands before a Christian cathedral of the twelflh or fourteenth centuries is a stranger to the buildings of either the Egyptian, - Grecian, Roman, Byzantine, or Moslim schools. One cannot but feel the beauty and symmetry of the Grecian, admire the elaborate Roman, wonder at the span of the By- zantine dome, and be delighted with the arabesque delicacy and airy Oriental design of the Moslim school ; but nothing on earth that I have seen bears the impress of its heavenly origin, in grand and rugged majesty, so much as the cathedral of the middle ages. CH. VII.] THE NILE. 113 As for the Egyptian ruins, ponderous as they are, I must say, in the face of all the antiquarian host, a common spectator can scarcely avoid laughing out loud at them» I am not going to hazard an opinion that there is nothing imposing about an Egyptian ruin, for there is ; but that something or other will be sure to provoke a laugh before the spectator has fairly set- tled with himself what it is that he admires. Some queer deity with a hawk-head — some strangely com- posed figure with cat face and hands, the very image of grotesque gravity, will be sure to interpose. Indeed, what with queer figures in all attitudes and dresses, the harlequin adjustment of the hieroglyphical de- vices, even where there is a really massive and im- posing grandeur, as in the hall of Karnac and of Philoe, something inconceivably ludicrous is sure to interrupt the proper effect. The two statues of Mem- non on the plains of Thebes are an instance of this mixed character I allude to : the Arabs call them Salaamat, or good morning. There is so much real solemnity in the feeling that they are the only re* mains of the great city of Thebes : they seem to sit surveying the desolation which they alone survive, like Marius looking over the ruins of Carthage, and, as it might be, widower monuments of glory departed, that for a time the spectator is sorry to see them ; and yet something after all not very grave forces one to laugh in spite of the great respect due to such aged memorials. But you shall judge, as far as a drawing may serve. If it were not a treason towards the more ancient remains, the temple of Denderah has always given me my best impression of the capabilities of 3ie Egyptian style ; but you shall judge for yourself. The founder is one of the later Ptolemies. And now I am called to another subject, in- volving a question of rather more present interest than the comparative features of pre-existing orders l2 114 A VISIT TO THE EAST. of architecture. If you can endure a frank opinion, I will answer you very plainly upon the subject of the present state of the country. After seeing the pasha himself at Alexandria, after hearing the en- comiums of the Frank consuls, observing the glitter of his armies and ships, after being told of his schemes, his undertakings, his buildings, and his schools, while all this was fresh in mind, it was but natural to think that there was something at the bottom of it all ; that he was a Turk really free from prejudice, an enlightened ruler ; in short, that rege- nerator of his country which it is a matter of fashion to call him in Europe. Now that I have seen his country I think very differently ; my good opinion has cooled down. I see that all that has been done is without foundation ; the government has gained a greater name, and more is said and talked about it ; but the people are more miserable, and are sunk even lower than they were before. All that the pasha has done is but dressing hia power in the most gaudy colours for his own lifetime ; it will fall in pieces of itself when he is removed. The boasted regeneration, after all, amounts only to this, — ^an attempt to engraft some European innovations upon a stock where they will never grow ; the stock is yearly failing, and the shoots will soon cease to be. It is all to exalt an usurping dominion, and to maintain its satellites, upon the neck of a people who are subject to worse op- pressions than under the Mamlouks or the Turks. The pasha would make his country on a level with Europe ; but he forgets that the secret of European strength, as indeed the strength of any state, is not in things external, but in the character and tone of her people ; arts and sciences are but at best only in- different or fallacious symptoms of civilisation, they are barely even indexes of it ; for real civilisation is when each man respects himself, his neighbour, and CH. Vll.] PRESENT STATE OF EGYPT, ETC. 115 fulfils every duty of life, under a due sense of the authority of every law divine and human. As long, therefore, as the pasha continues under the leading error of his later life, believing that all his endea- vours to surround himself with symptoms of Euro- pean art and science are really raising his kingdom, so it may be very safely predicted, that when the master-mind which now accumulates and transplants these symptoms of civilisation is withdrawn from his own task, then, with the departure of what is but the shadow of an advancement, will be laid bare the real progress of internal decay that is actually gaining ground underneath the plausible phase of the r^enerating process now in operation. The truth will then force itself forth, that in defiance of European applications, Egypt has never been any thing else but what she must ever remain, the basest of kingdomSt until the coming of a different era upon earth than the present scientific generation are likely to bring about. When I can bring myself to believe that to paint a sick man's cheeks will cure a diseased constitution, then, and then only, can I put any faith in Mehemet Ali*s remedial applications to his suffering country. The evil is to my mind incurable by human means ; for the Egyptian mind is thoroughly debased, barely human ; from such materials therefore he must be a wise statesman who can call into being a great people. But is not the pasha a deep-sighted man and very active ? Yes. Yet I have now to point out a principle in all he does that must eventually destroy his own dynasty and debase his people. He is him- self a Turk, and all his employes are Turks, or else European adventurers ; the mass of his people are the wealthy traders of Cairo, the Coptic Christians, and the agricultural population of the villages, the fellah Arabs. Now the only persons who derive any practical benefit from the pasha's undertakings are 116 A VISIT TO THE EAST. those employed by him, viz. Turk and European ad* venturers, whose treatment of the native population is such as the Jews who remained in the land suf- fered from their Chaldean conquerors, and which drew forth the prophet Jeremiah's book of Lamentations. The people are taxed to maintain the fabrics of those very improvements upon which the theory of the regeneration is built, and find them real and burden- some grievances. The government is exalted, but only so in name ; that is, by means of European newspapers ; it is really weaker. It is die French notion of glory (for which that people are always ready to sacrifice any thing substantial) carried into practice, and centralised in the pasha : for while they, the people, suffer, he, the sovereign, is praised and supposed by other people who understand nothing at all of the habits and feelings of the inhabitants, to be raising and regenerating the state. We English are far too practical a people in the main to have much sympathy with unsubstantial re- sults; and the effect of this is, that almost every Englishman leaves the country with a strong silent contempt for the change which he sees, and which he hears others call regeneration. The plain ac- count of the matter is, that underneath the sophis- tical atmosphere of glory, he sees the native popula- tion groaning under real moral misery: the charla- tan, the adventurer, the rogue, the renegade, and the employe, feasting in a luxury arising &om the suf- ferings of the poor. Such is the difference between regeneration of a state in theory, and its moral and real improvement in practice. The pasha, being an usurper, is the centre of an artificial glory derived from circumstances, which if they be the spontaneous exertions of a people them- selves, are credible tokens of a prosperity internal and solid ; but when they are brought from a dis- CH. VII.] PRESENT STATE OF EGYPT, ETC. 117 tance, and established by violence, they are about as much the substance of a prosperous state as the feathers of the jay which the jackdaw put on, were proo& to his companions that he had become in any degree the better for having put them on. I augur therefore that with the pasha himself will most as- suredly fall to pieces all the borrowed plumes of his government. However, to do him justice, we will see what he has done ; and then, when you have contrasted the present state of his country with the past, you will be enabled to judge for yourself. Now he has established security of life and pro- perty from all marauders, except himself; he has made Bedouins and other robbers respect him by daily hangings in Cairo. Europeans are suffered to wander where they will unmolested. There are no civil commotions, his officers know that a vigilant eye watches over their conduct. He has a camel- post from one end of the country to the other ; he has brought artisans of all kinds into the country, from Europe ; he has attempted to grow sugar ; he has brought in physicians and hospitals ; he has built schools, to encourage mechanics and sciences ; he has made a large fleet ; he has immense armies, perhaps 130,000 men under arms; his name is a perfect passport over a tract of country that never before knew what law was ; he has built palaces and mosques ; he has attempted to improve the cul- tivation of the soil, by the formation of a board of agriculture ; and when all this, to which more might be added, is put together, the result is a great deal of very delusive grandeur, centering upon the pasha himself, like the flame which was said to have played round the cradle of the infant Servius. The pasha alone is magnified in the eyes of Europe ; in the maintenance of this glory his satellites subsist ; and 118 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the people — the poor people — exhibit the lasting truth of the old maxim, ** Quidquid delirant reges, plectantar AchivL" (Hor. Bp.) Now is Egypt, whereby I mean domestic life and all the interests of social and family relationship in Egypt, the better for this regeneration? Not at all ; but much the worse ! The manufac- tures are worked to a loss, they do not repay the cost of production. The schools call into being a number of useless scholars, only to draft from them the more talented for the service of the government ; the remainder are returned on hand to their parents unfit for any ordinary purpose of life, such as life is there. The army is large only on purpose to shew a front of war against his master. The fleet again is for shew, not for service. The hospitals are for the soldiers. The hospital schools for army medical students. If a fellah Arab be sick, he must either die or go to a quack doctor, and this in the very village where there is a refined European surgeon for the garrison. Then agriculture is improved; but the peasant is plundered, starved and ruined, turned out of house and home a beggar. The cotton is sold for English money, which finds its way into the pasha's coffers, and from thence through various strainers, to the ill-paid soldiers, to maintain the artificial fabric of which Mehemet Ali is the centre. His imported artisans do their work, come and go or stay; but the people are not taught. The revenue is unnatural and forced, ground by the savagest exactions from the very penury of the people. Every thing is secure indeed from others, but not from himself: in monopolising power, he has claimed the sole right to rob. Under the Mamelukes the mosques enjoyed grants of pro- perty in land, and extensive districts belonged to CH. VII.] PRESENT STATE OP EGYPT, ETC. 119 them, being the donations of pious men who had not advanced to a contempt for their faith. These have been seized, and the priests and oolemas are now stipendiaries of the government, upon a reduced scale. Not a peasant in the land can call his rough wool shirt his own for two days. As an instance of what daily happens, a boatman in the crew belong- ing to a friend's boat had earned while in service at Cairo, the sum of 70 piastres (14«.) : he asked leave, on passing the village where his parents lived, to land and see them, as they had not seen each other for some years, and the son wished to give his earn- ings to his parents. The captain warned him of his danger, but he was determined to go ; he knew his parents were poor, and they had not met for some time. He was accordingly allowed to go, under a promise to rejoin his boat higher up at a certain village fixed upon ; but when the boat came to the village, the man was missing, nor was he there on the return of the boat some weeks afterwards. At last at a village lower down, they found him, and took him on board. He had hardly gone to sleep at all, from keeping watch, lest the boat might pass him in the night ; and the story he told was, that on entering the village he was seized by the sheick, put in prison, bastinadoed, his money taken from him, and com- pelled to leave the village without even seeing either his father or mother. There was no redress : the money was wanted for the pasha's service I In this manner whole districts are laid under contribution ; each village must share the burden, its sheick or chief being responsible for the payment ; so that it literally becomes his duty to bastinado all who have a little money to contribute, this being an Eastern preliminary to a forced payment never dispensed with. Perhaps it is thought impossible that the pa« tient should pay all he can without it ; but I never 120 A VISIT TO THE EAST. knew the application omitted. In the same way, fines are laid upon merchants of wool, of dates, and all manner of people who have money to pay ; the only rule being the readiest and least objectionable way of procuring it ; but procured it must be. Now the pasha is lord of the soil; as pasha he claims the power of the Pharaoh to whom his subjects mortgaged all their property in the soil. To improve his agriculture, there is a central coun- cil for this purpose in Cairo. They decide upon the gross amount of cotton, sugar, com, and other produce to be raised during the year; and in va- rious parts of the country there are magazines for collecting the district productions. Now should a feUah have sown his own wheat, and the crop be come up a foot high, yet if an order come from the central board that cotton must be planted instead of wheat, then away goes the wheat, and the cotton is planted ; and if when the cotton is grown, he want a part of it for his own use, he must first take the whole to the magazine, and there redeem, at the pasha's rate of sale, the part he wants, with money paid to him at the pasha's rate of remuneration for labour, which is little enough. It is said he receives a remunerating price, which I very much question ; but such is the system of bribery, beginning from tlie lowest employSj ascending up to the chief minis- ter, that deductis deducendis, when these exactions are satisfied, little enough remains for the poor fellah. For instance, suppose him to bring to the magazine 500 quintals of wheat, the Copt scribe says to him, " You give me 300 piastres, or I shall put you down only 400;" for witliout such extor- tions nothing in the whole country is done. Again, the pasha is very much commended for sending youths to Europe to learn European sci- ences, &c. But what kind of characters do they CH. VII.] PRESENT STATE OF EGYPT, ETC. 121 come back ? They have a smattering of French, of sciences and other matters, of all which they have a magpie knowledge. They return not Christians, but despisers of the prophet, with their faculties only the more sharpened to avail themselves of every iniquitous mode of rising in the world. They learn a curious sort of apish politeness, very differ- ent from either European gentility or Turkish re- serve. In a word, whatever they may be besides, they are generally finished scoundrels with scarce one single principle of right. I consider a strict Mahometan, setting aside his contempt for others, to be a moral estimable character ; but the new race of Arab-Europeans are real infidels, not even under- standing the sciences and arts, by means of which the ancient glory of Egypt is expected to revive. I have seen the style of these semi-Frenchmen in our visit to the different schools; and I confess I think the few that have come back from England, though destitute of the mannerism of the other, are both all the better for it, and have acquired some tolerably solid and useful accomplishments. Again, the present general poverty and destitution of the country is scarcely credible. Formerly, a boat of travellers landing at a village would have been in- vited to the house of the sheick, entertained with rice, fowls, mutton, eggs, &c., and on taking leave would have found a present of twelve fowls or a small sheep awaiting them — a gift of pure hospitality. Now, on landing at a village, a few blind old men and women are seen together with some ragged thin children, like the Cyclops with but one eye, — the second has been put out to prevent their being taken for soldiers when they grow up. The able men are hiding in the moun- tains, to escape a conscription or heavy tax that may be collecting. Oflen not an egg or a fowl is to be had for money. In a word misery of the worst M 122 A VISIT TO THE EAST. description reigns in the whole of his dominions ; and notwithstanding he is called the renovator of Egyptian greatness. He has beaten the Turks in two pitched battles, and he maintains his power over as great an extent of country as the Sultan; but in reality he is only a severer and more oppres- sive despot than any one of the great number who have preceded him. He has risen to power by taking a lesson from Europe, to which he was able to bring his people to conform. The Turkish sultan attempted the same, and found his people too proud to submit. But still the Egyptian pasha is a Turk at heart: he is a military usurper; and in all he does, he consults only for the military power that sustains him, for himself and the oligarchy that share his power. This is in accordance with strict Turkish custom ; but meanwhile the people, who are sup- posed to be hereby recovered from barbarism, find nothing more than a change of masters and an in- crease of oppression. The only persons, therefore, who do make progress are the officials of govern- ment; and they now discourse in French, despise the mosques, sit upon chairs, drink wine, come to the consul's evening parties, being in their manners what their country is in position — half way between Europe and the East. The great originator of all this change is now be- come an historical character ; and his name will, in some degree, belong to his century. I venture to predict, that he will be remembered rather as the cause of some singular movements of the European nations drawing closer and closer round the coming fate of the Turkish empire, as foreseeing the day not far distant, when the aspect of European power will take its complexion from events to be brought about at the Bosphorus, than as an agent of per- manent good or evil to the country over which he CH. VII.] PRESENT STATE OF EGYPT, ETC. 128 rules. That his power and his family will speedily lapse into insignificance may be safely foreseen, in that the military constitution of his government has no element of prosperity during peace ; and there is a curse upon rebellion that ever comes sooner or later. At the same time, that he is a master-mind none can deny : none who have seen him can fail to recognise the mild, affable, and dignified sovereign; none can refuse a certain sort of tribute to the keen, resolute, bold and fearless cunning by which he steered himself through the difficulties and mazes of the outset of his career ; and, granting the maxim of every Eastern usurper, that the art of government is to aggrandise the ruling power at the cost of the people, none can refuse to admire the more than usual share of impartial justice that has characterised every subsequent act of his despotic power, when freedom from necessities and exigencies left him at liberty to act as he thought fit. Still, there is some- thing degrading in the idea of a Turk submitting to be taught at the hands of European adventurers, and entrusting his kingdom to them ; and it is to be feared that he has, in so doing, lapsed considerably from the high and just sense which every sound Mahometan entertains of the providence and govern- ment of the Almighty, and that he has fallen a victim to the utilitarian school of infidel French policy, from which he has borrowed so many lessons. If this be so, as I fear too much is the case, then, with the decay of Mahometan faith, without the introduction of a better, will sink that principle whence could be en« tertained any immediate hope that a germ of better things was in store for this oppressed people. He is a mixed character ; and his greatest mis- fortune I believe to have been his connexion and association with the worst elements of Europe. European tactics were the first to suggest and have since furthered his rebellion ; now European force has turned against him, and prescribed him limits and peace. He is a strange mixture of faith, cre- dulity, discrimination, and curiosity, quite without learning, and yet the bone of contention between the most enlightened nations. Childish in the extreme at times, at others composed when all besides have trembled ; a lover of justice, and yet an oppressor ; polite, frank and open, and yet designing, shrewd and suspicious ; in short, a great contradiction, a rebel, and yet a great man. And now 1 hope you have lost all faith in rege- nerations upon modern principles. CHAPTER VIII, NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE IN EGYPT. You will remember that I gave you warning that you would find my narrative to betoken a very mis- cellaneous mind, — Apis Matins More modoque Grata carpentis thyma. When, therefore, you come to complain of the chance, accidental manner in which you receive the information you have asked for, I have really but to plead guilty, and say that I never promised otherwise. I never professed to be one of those liberal and enlarged minds, who seem to say that they digest at a glance the entire aspect of European affairs, and look upon the vast diversities which dif- ference of politicad constitution, of hereditary name and blood, and of religious creed, have brought into the world, with a noble and comprehensive spirit. Those who have any thing to say should surely, on being asked for their story, be allowed their own discretion in the manner of telling it. Even Dema- ratus, on being required to give his opinion in the presence of Xerxes, first certified himself that he might speak with impunity, before he would say any thing at all. And people who have put them- selves to no little inconvenience for the sake of mastering a story, are in a manner lords over their own dispensary, and keepers of their own narrative. Inquirers are really under the necessity of coming to them, except they are inclined to search and see M 2 126 A VISIT TO THE EAST. for themselves, — a thing providentially heyond the reach of most men, who are sentenced by circum- stances to spend much happier lives at home, en- gaged amongst their own duties in the little chosen circle of their friends. A few restless spirits only are they who rebel at the idea of being condemned to a life of domestic happiness, and who roam about to see and inquire into the ways and thoughts of other people ; and it certainly seems a little unfair to claim from them an immediate abandonment of the sorry privilege which they have so hardly earned, — viz. the right of telling their own story in their own way. Indeed, I fear that we narrators of travels have been of late much too liberal, that we have been too prodigal of our industry and zeal in inform- ing and amusing the public. Only see how they treat us in return. They aver that the time never was when travellers' stories were credible, and that no class of men are so notorious for mendacity as ourselves. Nevertheless, our judges forget that they must needs be an incapable tribunal ; for ex- cept they follow our steps, tliey cannot judge of our narratives, and therefore their condemnation must in some considerable degree be imaginary, and ought not greatly to disturb us. Of course I do not as- sert that none of us have ever practised upon the credulity of our readers ; for the more cunning the game, the greater the hunter's pride in snaring him ; and it may be, that the temptation fairly to entrap the sifting, sceptical, cautious and anticredulous pub- lic may at times have got the better of some few of our body. I merely suggest this ; but if so, it may fairly be asked, what propriety there can be in a complaint, of which the complainants themselves have given the occasion ? I am sorry to continue to o£Pend, but, at least, I have the plea of offending without system ; and just CH. VIII.] BUONAPARTE IN EGYPT. 127 before quitting Alexandria, I chanced to pick up a curious little book, a French translation by M. Alex. Cardin, dragoman of the French consulate, of the private journals kept by two natives during the time that Napoleon Buonaparte was in Egypt. Abdarrhahman Gabarti, the chief of these two jour- nalists, was a man of considerable reputation for his learning, and possessed of a great influence among his own countrymen ; he was also a member of the divan which Buonaparte formed before the revolt of Cairo. Mou A Item Nicholas el Turki was a Maronite Christian, and a poet of some celebrity at the court of the Emir Beshir on the Mount Leba- non, before he came to reside in Cairo. The few extracts I am about to make introduce a personage fresh in the memories of many now living, and one whose coming upon earth is likely to have more influence than any man of his class has ever hitherto exerted in the world's history. Napoleon Buonaparte has not been only a military adventurer, like Hannibal or Julius Caesar — a mere man at arms, living a locomotive life surrounded by soldiers, and afterwards forgotten, or, at least, serv- ing no subsequent end, further than from time to time '* To point a moral, or adorn a tale." Napoleon's life has had a visible influence upon the tone of thought of private life in Europe ; he was looked upon as an emancipator, a champion of li- berty and glory during his life ; and he is now re- membered and regretted as a sufferer and a mar- tyr in that cause. Europe abounds with men who have little or no religion ; and even where there is a leaning towards religious belief, all is wreck and ruin, from the absence of any solid system in which religion may take root and come to maturity. Hu- man nature yearns afler liberty and glory, and 128 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Napoleon promised both; and now that Napoleon himself is gone, Napoleons history, his singular exploits, the striking points of his character, his imperial dignity, his avowed doctrines of liberty and glory, are rallying-points for irreligious minds. The religion of Jesus Christ promises liberty and glory ; but then they are rewards that are to come chiefly in another world. The secret of the great influence of Napoleon lies in the deception of which he was master, the promising an enjoyment in this life of that which can only be enjoyed in another and a better life. To bring men to real liberty and glory is the work of redemption, Jesus Christ is the Redeemer; Satan's servants disguise themselves as angels of light, and the doctrine of Antichrist is a counterfeit of the doctrine of the cross. Napoleon's promises were in substance the same as the Redeemer's, liberty and glory; and this does but mark Napoleon as one of the many servants of Antichrist who are already come, and are yet to come. The extraordinary power of delusion which these men possess, may be seen in the fact, that Napoleon was not the less, in the eyes of the multitude, a champion of liberty and glory, although the people were themselves paying annually nearly half a million of human lives as the price of their liberty and glory, and were bringing upon other people all the miseries and afflictions of war, to- gether with the convulsions of rebellion and revolu- tion. Antichrist sets aside the pains, the trials, the watchings, the humiliation, and the afflictions, which beset the narrow path of Jesus Christ ; and coming forward with mock substitutes of the Gospel-rewards, promises an immediate enjoyment : this is what Na- poleon did; and his immense success shews how truly the Gospel has spoken of the acceptance to be found by those who come ^* in their own name.*' CH. VIII.] BUONAPARTE IN EGYPT. 129 The following, although somewhat miscellaneous extracts, will shew how consistently he went on to build his own power upon the ruins of true religion, and with what patient wiliness he sought to exalt himself above all that is called God. M. Gabarti, it will be remembered, is a stanch follower of the prophet. "In 121 S (the Mahometan era) commenced wars, calamities, overthrows, revolutions, and ge- neral ruin. " On the 10th of the month Moubarrem, letters were received at Alexandria, speaking of the arrival of twenty- five English sail, who, sending a boat, demanded to speak with the chiefs of the town. They were taken before Said Mohammed Kerim, and said, * We are English — we are in search of the French, who are come out with a numerous fleet — we do not know where they are bound for, they will perhaps come here suddenly, you will not be able to repel them, we come to offer you our as- sistance.* Said Mohammed, suspecting some plot, replied, ' This country belongs to the sultan my master ; neither the French or any one else have any thing to do with it.' " The 18th day of the month the inhabitants were astonished at the appearance of an army of French, covering the country like locusts.*' Eighteen days after the seizure of Alexandna, Napoleon marched up to Cairo, on the west bank of the river, * On his arrival, the Musulmen attacked a column of 6000, under Desaix, with loud bowl- ings and cries. ** They thought that, in order to con- quer, they had but to make a noise, while people of sense wished them to remain silent ; — * the prophet and his disciples,' said they, * fought with sabres and swords and not with barkings like dogs.' " The following day two messengers were sent 130 .A VISIT TO THE EAST. to ask for peace on the part of the sheicks; and relating how they had seen the great Frenchman, brought the following letter from him : — " We have already sent you a proclamation suffici- ently explicit (alluding to those sent from Alexandria on first landing). We there informed you, that we had no other intention in coming than to put an end to the reign of the Mamlouks. They despised the French ; they seized the property of individuals, and of the sultan ; they have dared to attack us, and we have re- ceived them as they have deserved. We have killed some, and taken others prisoner, and put the rest to flight. We shall pursue them till not another remains in Egypt. The sheicks, the ulemas, all officers and rajas, may continue undisturbed till the end of the war. ** Order was now established ; and when the birth-day of the prophet came. Napoleon ordered it to be kept as a festival by his army, and paraded them through the streets with music. The sheicks offend him greatly by refusing to wear his ribbons of three colours. The dragoman told them, that by wearing them they would be more respected by the army ; but they answered, * In the eyes of God, and our fellow-believers, we shall be degraded.' Na- poleon was highly enraged, and gave them twelve days to reflect. " The 18th of the month Ribi Ussani, the sheicks were made to write the following letter to the people, — " The French are the friends of the^ sultan of the Osmanlies, and the enemies of his enemies. Prayer is said in the name of the sultan. The coin bears the letters of his name. Religion is duly honoured. The French are true believers; they revere the prophet and the Koran ; they have treated the pilgrims of Mecca with distinction ; they have celebrated the rising of the Nile; and have contributed to the splendour of the CH. YIII.] BUONAPARTE IN EGYPT. 131 birth-day of the prophet. The French command us to inform you, that they are taking measures to secure all that is needed for the two sacred towns (Medina and Mecca). ** The 10th of Djemazi ul ewel witnessed the revolt of Cairo, which was subdued at last, with some loss to the French army. It appears that the house-tax and other grievances gave rise to it. On the first of the following month, Djemazi Ussani, Napoleon caused the sheicks to write as follows to the people : — " The advice of the Ulemas to the Egyptians of Cairo. " May God preserve us from revolt, and from its consequences present and remote ; and let us pray to him to remove the seditious from among us. ** Inhabitants of Egypt, there have been troubles in the town of Cairo. Miserable fools have excited discord between the people and the French army, who were living on such good terms together ; thev have caused the death of many Musulmen, and the pillaee of several houses. The fire of discord has been abated by the un- seen grace of the Almighty, and our intercession with the general- in-chief. He is a man whose mind is per- fect, and whose heart is well disposed to the Moslims. He is full of charity to the poor; without him the army would have destroyed the town, and killed the inha- bitants. ^* Think no more of revolt ; and lend no more an ear to the ill-disposed, to people who consider not the end of things. Be without alarm for your property, country, families and religion. The Almighty gives power to whom he will. '^ All the instigators of the revolt have been killed. " We give you this advice to warn you from throw- ing yourselves in death's way. Attend to your busi- ness, and to your religious duties, and pay the taxes, " The man of religion giveth heed to counsel. Farewell." The troubles which this revolt occasioned were 13ft A VISIT TO THE EAST. at length quelled by a series of severe measures, which occupy several pages of M . Gabarti*s journal ; and when tranquillity was established, he had leisure, with several of his friends, to visit the different works that were going on under the direction of the various savans. It is curious to observe how Buonaparte has neglected nothing that could gain power over the minds of those whom he subdued by force of arms. The progress and advancement of science is an ele^ ment of worldly glory, and a powerful one; and Buonaparte knew well how to render it subservient to his own ends, as the sequel will shew. " All the French little and great can read and write. When a Musulman comes to them out of curiosity, they receive him with great politeness ; and when they find him intelligent they redouble their attentions, and shew him all kinds of curious things. " I have been several times in the library, and they have shewn me a number of curious things. They brought me a large volume containing a life of the prophet. There was his noble portrait as well as their mind could conceive it. He is standing upright, looking at the heavens, and threatening the people ; his right hand is armed with a sabre, and the book is in his left. Another picture represents the caliphs ; another, the ascension of the prophet on his horse Borak. There were pictures of seas, of coasts, of mountains, of the plains of Egypt, of all countries, of animals, birds, plants of all regions, books, treatises of medicine, and all manner of things. " The painters occupy the house of Ibrahim, lieutenant of Sennari : among them is the painter Aridjon (Rigo), who has made portraits that seem as if they would speak ; he has painted some of the great sheicks full length ; and they have placed them in the room of the general-in-chief. CH. VIII.] BUONAPARTE IN EGYPT. 133 '* When the French find an animal which is not in their country, they put it into a water which they know, which keeps it for a long time from decay. " The chemist lives in the house of Hassan Kia- chef the Georgian : I have seen there surprising things. They poured into a cup a water prepared and tlien a few drops of another water, a smoke of different colours came out of the cup, and after- wards there remained no more water but a yellow- ish stone, which they allowed us to touch. They took a quantity of white powder, and striking it lightly with a hammer upon an anvil, it produced a noise like the report of a gun ; the chemist laughed at the fear which this caused us. ** He took a bottle, and putting it empty into the water, he caused some air to enter it, and after- wards applying a lighted match, it caused an explo- sion. In short, we saw many curious results of the combination of the elements. ** The physician turned round a wheel which made sparks, on touching a bottle there resulted an ex- plosion ; when the tip of the bottle is touched, a shock is felt, and if another person touches, he feels it also. We have witnessed things quite incompre- hensible to us." But to return to Buonaparte. I will add one more of his addresses to the inhabitants of Cairo : " In the name of God the Giver of mercy. *' Buonaparte, general-in-chief of the French army, to the inhabitants of Cairo great and small. " Stupid and foolish men, who have no foresight of the end of things, have excited the inhabitants of Cairo to revolt, God has punished their treacherous intentions and wicked actions. The holy One and the Almighty has commanded me to have mercv upon his creatures ; submissive to his will, I have pardoned, although in an excess of an^er and much pained at this revolt. As a punishment I have abolished the divan I had formed, N 134 A VISIT TO THE EAST. and which would in two months have established order in the town. *' Your tranquillity since then has made me think no more of the crime of the guilty instigators of the revolt, and I meditate the creation oi a new divan. ** Ulemas and sherifis, inform your people that no one betrays me with impunity, he tnat conspires against me runs to his own destruction ; no one upon earth being able to save him, he will not escape the wrath of God, whose decree he does not observe. The man that is wise understands that all I have done has been put in execution by the order and will of God alone ; a man must be blind and a fool to doubt it. ^' Inform your people also, that the Almighty has lone ago destined my hand to annihilate the enemies of Islam, and to destroy the Cross, The holy God has announced that I shoidd come from the West to Egypt to exterminate those who commit injustice: the wise man sees in aU the fulfilment of his designs. Inform your people that the Koran has predicted to many what has just nappened, and that it contains predictions of what is to happen. The word of God in his book is true and just ; the proof of this truth is, that the Mu- sulmen return to me with pure intentions and sincere friendship. Should any among them, in fear of my arms and power, dare to curse and hate me, they are fools that know not that God reads the heart, and dis- cerns there what the eye cannot perceive. God will curse and punish the hypocrite who shall betray me in secret as well as openly. '^ Inform them that I penetrate into the most hidden folds of the human heart ; I know at a glance what men think, though they keep silence; a day will come when all secrets shall be revealed. All that I have done, you know has been done by the will of God, which none can resist: a man may in vain seek to oppose what God has done by my hands. ^' Happy such as are united in heart with me. Fare- well." Soon afler this piece of blasphemy Buonaparte withdrew his troops for the Syrian campaign, which terminated abruptly at the disastrous attack upon CH. YIII.] BUONAPARTE IN EOTPT. 135 Acre, which Sir Sidney Smith assisted Djezzar Pasha to defend : afler his return he was called to Abou- kir, where he defeated an army of Turks, and then returned to Cairo, where Mou Allem Nicholas re- lates the following address as having been made by Napoleon to the members of the divan, whom he summoned to congratulate him on his victory: '' I thought," said Buonaparte to them, '' that you loved me, that you would rejoice at my victory, and sympathise with my sorrow : I see it is quite the contrary, and still I shew you nothing but friendship. I have told you that I liked the pro- phet Mahomet; he was a great warrior, like my- self, he knew what triumphs were, he won twenty battles ; I myself have gained no few, and have yet to gain more, as you shall either see or hear* You endure with reluctance the government of the French, and the time will come when you will un- bury the bones of the French to water them with your tears." Buonaparte often held similar discourse with the ulemas, and wrote letters to them of the same pur- port. These letters, translated into Arabic, were printed and affiched on the walls for every one to read. He even promised them to embrace their religion, to build a mosque in his own name, and to benefit in every way the Musulman religion ; yet the ulemas were not the dupes of these words. " They are lies," said they, '' which he propounds to esta- blish himself in Egypt. Is he not a Nazarene, and the son of a Nazarene ?" Mahomet was a conqueror, and he has spread a faidi and worship which is a spurious counterpart of the Mosaic and Christian scheme ; he has been per- mitted to spread his religion over many countries, and it is impossible to deny that there are elements of truth in it, and that his followers are not altoge- 136 A VISIT TO THE BAST. ther a reprobate people. As a man, Napoleon does very nearly resemble Mahomet, for both used reli- gion as a means of advancing their own personal power ; but whether both as individuals be equally reprobate, I do not determine. The doctrines they have left behind them materially differ. Napoleon has given a practical consistency to a notion that li- berty and glory are to be easily obtained in this life, without seeking them in the way which Jesus Christ has taught men to seek them. Napoleon's influence upon men in his own country especially and else- where is emphatically that of the god of this world, whose servant he was all his life. It was therefore true when he said that he came to destroy the Cross; his whole life was devoid of one single Christian principle from the beginning to the end, and his in- fluence over men's minds as long as it is permitted to last will be antichristian, in a sense in which Ma- homet's doctrines are not antichristian. The exist- ence of such a numerous multitude as the Maho- metan people are, possessing the religion they do, after our Lord has declared, '^ he that hath not the Son hath not the Father," is one of those deep mys- teries in the providence of this world which the mind of man cannot fathom ; but the Mahometan doctrine, clogged as it is with fable and impurity, does never- theless remove the mind from this life to the one which is to come. This modern infidel system, of which liberty and glory are the tenets, cuts off and annuls all that lies beyond mere animal existence in this world, and does in fact render men worshippers of phantoms, the possession of which they can never attain. CHAPTER IX. OF PRIMEVAL THBOLOGT, AND THE PARALLEL TESTIMONIES OF THE EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS AND THE BOOKS OF HOLT SCRIPTURE CONSIDERED AS SACERDOTAL RECORDS. Even a superficial observer will hardly fall to be struck with one great point of parallel between the antiquities of Egypt and the holy Scripture, viz. as respectively the oldest existing notices of the pecu- liarities of early social and domestic life. Horner^ it is true, and a few other of the early Grecian poets, introduce us, in the way of scattered notices and in- cidental allusion, to a state of society differing in many material features from that which is now found to exist ;. still nothing so completely lifts the veil that is drawn over the past as do these two parallel records of Jewish and Egyptian testimony, now to be considered in connexion with each other. The lately discovered cipher of the hieroglyph has brought about such an entire disinterment, such a resuscitation, of early Egyptian times, that it is scarcely a matter of surprise if sanguine inquirers should have expected numerous wonders and great discoveries to be brought to light; and yet, after all, nothing results which does not provokingly taUy with the existing body of historic tradition as col- lected jQrom pagan history ; there is not so much as a symptom of revolution, scarce even of change, to be undergone by the received current of historical statements. There is nothing extraordinary in the N % 138 A VISIT TO THE EAST. world that has come to light ; it is a mere polity and constitution of the same general order and com- plexion with those which have prevailed elsewhere and at other times, amply stored, indeed, with ordi- nary details, such as can be conceived natural to human life under ancient ancestral polities, but with really nothing more. Allowing, therefore, for all that is wonderful and enchanting in being suddenly introduced to a series of manners, customs, practices, wants, habits, ranks, trades, implements, and posses- sions, between which and our own age there lies so obscure and mysterious an interval, yet a very little while is, nevertheless, sufficient to make an observer turn away from the subject with a positive indiffer- ence. After all, what is there but the common ordinary dull monotonous routine of domestic existence? buy- ing and selling, planting and building, ploughing and baking, birth, marriage, and death, household and municipal life ; mere dry, wearisome, domestic de- tails, about which the patience of an antiquary might unprofitably torture itself, but unusually destitute of the ennobling or romantic character which gives an intrinsic interest. Except the immense lapse of time which has snapped in two their connexion with things present, and die sudden manner in which we have come to know them, be accepted as an equivalent. However this may be, the feeling of all observers of the kind of life thus brought to light is seldom found to rise beyond an acknowledgment that it is very curious ; no one feature does or can seriously demand to be admired. But, not to decide whether there may or may not be something sufficiently grand and mysterious in the very power thus given of lifting the veil that lies over so long an era, fraught with events so impor- tant, and something sufficiently majestic in the mere attempt to dive so deep into time, even with the cer- CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 139 taiinty of not finding pearls to reward the labour and risk of the search, still it can scarcely be that the pro- vidence of the Almighty, who works so much which either we do not see or see but in part and darkly, and which has in times past connected this land in a peculiar manner with the course, dealings, and go- vernment of his only Church then upon earth, Jewish Israel, should now permit the daily domestic life of ancient Egypt to be so fully brought to light as it has been, except for some benevolent purpose of good. With the humble view, tlierefore, be it ever so faintly or obscurely, to track the footsteps of God's overruling providence, working out the good of his Church, the following remarks are suggested. A second ancient independent series of records has been brought to light suddenly, and a question naturally arises. Does it materially coincide in the general course of its testimony with that of the one already existing ? and this leads as naturally to an- other question, viz. If so, what is the value of such general coincidence? In mere matters of domestic life, and in other such minor points of ordinary in- terest, a correspondence has already been traced out between the monuments and the holy Scripture ;' but, then, this can but shew that as historic records they mutuaUy support and confirm each other; a position at which no sceptical mind will be much disturbed, for it in no degree touches upon the only question that would disturb him, namely, whether holy Scrip- ture be an inspired book ; for such coincidences, however complete, prove nothing more in £Eivour of the Scripture, which they do not prove in kind of Manetho, Herodotus, or Diodorus Siculus. But still the holy Scriptures and the monuments ^ The Bible illustrated by the Egyptian Monuments, by C. W. Taylor. 140 A VISIT TO THE EAST. of Egypt are a series of parallel contemporary do- cuments, and there is a point which has been over- looked in which they greatly corroborate each other. They are respectively sacerdotal records ; we owe their existence and preservation to the institution of a sacerdotal order or priesthood set apart in each people by God's providence for his service, and by him ordained for the benefit of his creatures. How much have we not of late lost sight of this true view of holy Scripture as the sacerdotal trea- sure of the Levitical priesthood, and have forgotten that we owe in a great measure their composition and their preservation, as well as our belief in them as inspired writings, entirely to the divine in- stitution of the priesthood. The Bible is received as a book of God's word, a revelation, an inspired volume ; and, looking at the uses to which it is put, it seems to be made an armoury of religious con- troversy, a source of individual perplexity, and of much anxious agitated and often fruitless search after truth ; and this may be partly owing to the manner in which it is popularly disconnected from the sacer- dotal institution which gave it birth. It is not re- membered that the people whence we have derived the Scriptures are at this moment as distinct a peo- ple as they were at any part of the time while the Scriptures were being formed, and that they owe their peculiar character and separate existence to the influence of their own Scriptures upon their minds. Our popular notion of the Bible discards all sense of that mysterious dealing of the Almighty which called forth a church, a priesthood, and a law, with a dispensation of prophets, out of which to bring to life the sacred oracles ; neither does it inquire whe- ther the same dealing has or has not any witness of its extension to other people. It seems to take for granted, that a work so wonderfully curled on CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 141 in the church and people of the Jews, by so many solemn institutions and divine gifls, has been broken off and abandoned, or was from the first designed to issue in nothing more than the casting a collection of inspired tracts upon the wide world, to take what effect and bear what fruit they might. The peculiar and strict holiness which fitted the authors of the several books, in their respective generations, to be chosen of God as men whereby he should speak to his people, together with the caution and fear which such a thought should inspire, is lost sight of ; that is, we are ready enough to take the Bible, but not to remember what it is, and whence we have it; our popular view is imperfect and defective. The Old Testament is really the sacred treasure of the Levi- tical priesthood in Israel, witnessed, preserved, and attested by them, as the writings of the New Testa- ment are, in like manner, the fruit of the apostolic commission of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and are wit- nessed and attested by the Church founded upon the doctrine and by the labours of the Apostles. The Scriptures are, therefore, connec^d inseparably with a progressive living order and dispensation. It is also to be observed, that the earth had the gift of a Church in Abraham four generations before there was any written Scripture ; and even the institution of the priesthood and the gifts of the law were anterior to the writing of the books of Moses. Indeed, a very little consideration must suffice to shew, that were the Scriptures not exclusively sacerdotal records, guarded, witnessed, and attested by a sacerdotal in- stitution, possessed of a divine gift, and promise of perpetuity, they would not only soon be lost, but could not while they survived possess any authority binding us to receive them greater than Mahomet's Koran, which professes to come without any inter- mediate dispensation direct from heaven; and, in 142 A VISIT TO THE EAST. short, even this book has owed its maintenance, as far as we can see, entirely to the sacerdotal colleges, which guard, maintain, uphold, and expound its laws and doctrine. This view, then, may serve to point out a pa- rallel between the holy Scriptures and the monu- ments of Egypt, as a body of current sacerdotal documents, differing in no other very essential point except that in which the kingdoms themselves where they originated differed. The one an Israel or church, enjoying an immediate special covenant with God ; the other, an ordinary royal polity, based upon such incomplete theological doctrines as the early sacerdotal institutions themselves possessed. The constitution, so to speak, of the early Egyp- tian theology, as embodied in its priesthood, is exceed- ingly remarkable. Monuments, anterior to the time of Abraham, evidence a powerful system of temple and sacerdotal worship, and imply an active and es- tablished body of priests, formed to teach and en- force a theology containing the chief elements of the early religion of mankind, and this at a time when it is commonly taken for granted that the Gentile tribes had lost or perverted the truth. The early Egyptian theology, as shewn by the monuments, taught the doctrine of the unity of God, — a truth veiled under emblems that were afterwards per- verted, — the sinfulness of man, sacrifices for sin by the blood of victims, the need of moral purity and sanctity, the doctrine of a future life of happiness or misery, the separate existence of the soul, the day of judgment according to the deeds done in this life. They possessed an organised priesthood, which had the gifl of ordination, and consisted of subordinate ranks ; their temples were equal in magnitude to those now known ; their services were part sacrifi- cial, part liturgic; they possessed solemn mysterious CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 143 rites, to which none were admitted but such as pre- pared themselves rigorously by a long course of previous fasting and prayer. The priesthood con- secrated the royal dynasty of the country ; and, from the highest caste of royalty down to the lowest, the entire life of the people appears to have been bound up in their religion, and its sacerdotal constitution. Take the literal narrative of the lives of the three Jewish patriarchs, and we shall not find in them the traces of so complete a body of theological truth as the monuments shew the Egyptians to have been possessed of. The religion of the patriarchs ap- pears to have been eminently one of practical faith, t. e. they chose a line of action and life in itself un- reasonable, and to be accounted for only by their faith. It was clearly unreasonable for a man to go about to slay his only son, in whom he expected the blessing of all the nations of the earth ; and yet &ith here overcame reason, and by this faith Abraham pleased God. Yet it must be quite clear that Abra- ham was called from a fomily who were strangers to the royal and sacerdotal polity, such as was then established in Egypt. It will be therefore no dispa- ragement to the holiness of the patriarchal religion to say, that Jacob's family on coming into Egypt found there a traditionary polity of religion, which was possessed of greater theological knowledge than themselves. Outwardly, to the eyes of men, the patriarchs had but little to distinguish them ; they lived the simple pastoral life, which still survives in the mountains and valleys of Arabia. ** Thy ser- vants are shepherds, both we and also our fathers" (Gen. xlvii. 3), was their own answer to the king of Egypt. Their very manner of life, therefore, pre- cludes the possibility of a comparison being drawn between their system of theology, as inherited from their forefathers, and that of Egypt, where for some 144 A VISIT TO THE EAST. -J generations there had existed a vigorous external polity of religion, maintained by an active sacerdotal order. The reasons of God's choice of different men to be his instruments, must ever remain veiled to us in this life. It is clear that the patriarchs were called, and their privileges were but partially appre- hended, and by but a few ; to the surrounding peo" pie they were but as shepherds and neighbours ; and to the Egyptians, it is expressly said, that every He- brew was an abomination. God was pleased to al- low the lawgiver of his people to be brought up in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and there are many important points of resemblance in the constitution of Israel, as founded by Moses, with that of Egypt. These two facts seem clearly to imply that, in point of hereditary knowledge of die doctrines of religion, and the past history of God's dealings with his crea- tures, the sacerdotal polity of Egypt possessed ad- vantages which the family of Israel could not have had, except by that special revelation which was af- terwards given to Moses, but which we have no rea- son to conclude was necessarily given to them : the books of Moses are, at least, silent upon the subject. Under the circumstances, therefore, there was a na- tural difficulty for the king of such a polity as Egypt to recognise a people possessed of an especial cove- nant with God in a tribe of shepherds, who dwelt in tents, and whose occupation was a mark of the lowest caste in their own country. Indeed, this may be observed, as a ruling feature of God's pro- vidences in the choice of peculiar men to be his ser- vants, that, in the current way of men's thinking, their outward appearance does not bear a visible testi- mony to the character given them. They have never seemed in men's eyes at the time to be what others afterwards have acknowledged them to be. The Jews had the same trial put before them in the re- CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 145 cognition of their own Messiah under which Pharaoh &iled, by not discerning God's hand to be with his people ; that is, their outward appearance to worldly eyes did not correspond with the character they claimed. And so it was when Christ came: they could not discern the one whom they looked for, ** that he should deliver Israel," in the " Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief," who suffered himself to be crucified. — ^But to return to the subject. Take the course of both polities, when the people of the covenant gained what the Egyptians had pos- sessed from much earlier times, viz. a visible exter- nal establishment of religion, a distinct sacerdotal order, and forms of liturgy and sacrifice, in short, the development of the Mosaic ceremonial law, in the visible form instituted by King Solomon ; and then the Church - principle is forcibly brought in view. Israel, the Church, is warned, chastised, punished, spoken to by prophets, and receives revelation after revelation ; Egypt, the religious polity, is suffered gradually to corrupt her religion, and to turn away to idolatry, and nevertheless receives nothing more than a side-waruing from the prophets of a people whom they had never ceased to despise. Israel, ever stiffhecked and rebellious, slaying the prophets, and stoning them that were sent to her, yet never lacked its faithful remnant ; while Egypt, with all her wis- dom, and all her first truth of doctrine, and notwith- standing her long and at first successful struggle with corruption, is at last come to be the basest of king- doms. There is, then, an element of important evidence in the series of Egyptian documents which have come to light. As the religious records of a king- dom built up and founded upon a body and system of early theology, they are an important part of one great chain of historical evidence, which shews that 146 A VISIT TO THE EAST. a theological and sacerdotal system is the only prac- tically cementing element which human polities are acquainted with ; that although as an abstract truth, and in the way of a theoretical position, it may suf- fice to say, that religious belief is the cementing power of all human society, on descending to prac- tice and matter of fact, religious belief, as affecting communities of men, is to be realised only in sys- tems of theological doctrine maintained by sacer- dotal orders. At least this much is true, tliat the earth is as yet ignorant of a polity founded upon the negative doctrines of atheism. The French re- volution was bom out of the doctrines of atheism ; and what event upon the face of the earth ever re- vealed the Satanic features of the human character so fatally as that convulsion ? The people then became literally ferocious demons ; and the ima- gination can hardly conceive malignant spirits more eagerly gloating over the torments and miseries of others, than the principal movers of that over- throw were known to have done. Such has been one fatal specimen of the effect of negative doc- trines upon a multitude, — ^ rapine, plunder, revenge, torture, and murder, every evil passion and vice that changes- ii(ian into an image of die devil. It is not, therefore, enough to propose religion in an abstract form, to combat the above evils of unbelief. Ex- perience shews that, without a system of theology and a sacerdotal order, religion will never be much more than an abstract idea to the multitude. But lest it should be supposed that any sacer- dotal system with a form of theology is capable of working out the design of God for the sanctification of mankind, it will suffice to point to the subsequent fate of Egypt, \vhich once possessed both in great purity. This is an age when men accustom them- selves to look for true religion in any sort of reli- r CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 147 gious society, apart from the Church ; and either account a mere knowledge of revealed doctrines to be an adequate substitute for her communion ; or if they should discern the necessity of something more than mere knowledge, any one teacher is judged to be as generally efficient as another. The doctrine of a divinely commissioned and divinely protected sacerdotal order is disbelieved. Now if they expect religion to be permanently maintained in a corrupt world by such powers as they would substitute for the Church, I would ask, upon what powers do they rely for the maintenance of religion which Egypt did not possess? Had she not an entire scheme of theo- logy ? Had she not an able organised priesthood, to say the least, not less learned, not less divinely em- powered than any modern body of sectarian teachers? and, notwithstanding, her latter end has been that she is become the basest of kingdoms. To what good purpose, therefore, has this been suffered, except it be to give mankind a signal proof that God has pledged his Holy Spirit to one and but one peculiar polity and constitution, the Catholic Church ? It is true that many in this generation ac- count but little of her communion ; but I would ask them, when, after disowning the Church's divine ministry, they have severed one link which connects the influences of heaven with this earth, in what are the chiefest of their proposed substitute systems bet- ter than that of Egypt? It will be replied, I sup- pose, that the doctrines of the Gospel are now re- vealed. True! but if you disown the divine ministry whereby man is brought into actual contact with the powers of heaven, let the doctrines of the Gospel be ever so plainly revealed, what else can they be to you but truths which you must be content to view by retrospect, as Egypt viewed them by anticipation? The one sort of knowledge is not more available than 148 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the other, because it is plainer ; but compare modern systems with Egypt as working realities, and the pa- rallel is undeniably in favour of Egypt. She was never a chaotic disorganised multitude, wearing a different form in each successive generation, a house- hold ever dividing against herself ; but she set out with a complete body of primeval dieology, she pos- sessed a vigorous sacerdotal order, royalty, temples, sacrifices, prayers, fasts, ceremonies, observances; the priests were for generations the teachers of the people, and religion was the life of both. But all complete as this may seem, there lacked one thing, the promise of the indwelling Spirit pledged to the Church, and without this Egypt fell away to become the basest of kingdoms : in die words of the apostle — " Because that, when they knew God, they glo- rified him not as God, neither were thankful ; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened ; . . . and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those diings which are not convenient" (Rom. i. 21, 28). To draw this out a little more at length, it will be necessary to trace out the chief points of corre- spondence between both series of documents, taken as records of theology. Now up to AbrsJiam's time the holy Scripture is a record of primeval religion, of which the main features are these: The religion of Adam, after he had fallen from his original righteousness, and become subject to the curse of death ; and after he was condemned to eat bread in the sweat of his brow, and to cultivate a soil that was to bear thorns and thistles ; and after Eve was sentenced to conceive and bear children in sor- row, and to be subject unto her husband, — contained the promise of a Redeemer hereafler to come, viz. CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. ' 149 '' the seed of the woman, who should bruise the serpent's head."^ The next feature that shews itself is, Abel's sacrifice, which brought its counterpart of sin in the religious envy of Cain. In the generation of Enos theology gained its liturgic form, and men began to call upon God. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, set an example of practical faith, and preached the doctrine of a day of judgment (St. Jude ver. 14) ; and on his translation to heaven, a future state was hereby revealed and attested. Lastly, there came Noah, a preacher of righteousness, who completed the body of primeval theology, containing now the hope of a Redeemer, the doctrine of an intermediate and typic expiation of sin by blood- shedding, the necessity of prayer, the doctrine of a day of judg- ment, the doctrine of practical faith, the doctrine of a future life, and the doctrine of righteousness, or obedience to the moral law of God ; all of which, as we have seen, were distinctly embodied in the theology of Egypt, with the exception of the pro- mise of the Messiah ; and it is to be remarked with respect to this, that Egyptian theology possessed this promise in the times of its early purity, but that in later ages it was lost, or at least transpired, under the fabled disguise of Osiris, who is represented as suffering death from the Evil Spirit. The flood came upon Noah's generation as they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage. And afler Noah entered upon the earth from the ark, he became the teacher as well as the father of the people who then spread over the earth ; and the above doctrines appeared to have gained ^ The institution of the Sabbath has not been here men- tioned, because it does not prominently appear either in the book of Genesis or upon the monuments ; although Bishop Horsley's reasoning is conelusiye to shew that this was a part of primeval religion (Sermon zxii.). O 2 150 A VISIT TO THE EAST. in him a covenant of long sufferance ; ** While the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease" (Gen. viii. 22) : of this covenant the rainbow is the token. And, again, when the tribes of the earth were separated into different languages, the above was the substance of the then known theo- logy, which they carried away with them. To this day it is this primitive theology of Noah which sur- vives, in forms more or less perverted, all over the heathen world ; and it is a remark worth repeating, that there is not upon earth a polity of men without some elements of this early theology entering into the heart of their constitution. No sooner does Abraham appear in the sacred narrative than a fresh element is introduced, which places henceforth a new and lasting distinctive mark ' between the two records ; that is, the holy Scripture ceases to be, from this time, a direct record of pri- meval theology only, — a Church-covenant is given to man in Abraham ; and the holy Scripture now becomes a wonderful mingled collection of inspired documents, embodying the successive revelations made to the people of Abraham's covenant, until revelation and prophecy are finally sealed in the teaching of the promised Messiah, the seed of the woman, foretold to Adam, and in that of his chosen apostles. Considered as historic records, the Scrip- tures from this time shew the progress of the people of the covenant through a long series of God*s deal- ings with them ; they display the strength of God*s covenant absorbing the primeval doctrines into itself, and shedding its divinely sustained light upon the surrounding dying embers of the early doctrines which Noah taught; they exhibit the covenant of the Church in conflict with vice, idolatry, schism, and rebellion, and shew how a stubborn and stiff- CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 151 necked people have been made, through a course of several hundred years, God*s chosen instruments, whereby to give to the nations, hereafter to be called into the Church-covenant of the Messiah, such a practical and intelligible lesson of their almighty Father's will and his judgments, that he that run- neth may read ; while the Egyptian records do but exhibit the increasing decay and corruption of the early truths they once possessed. But to put this view of the Jewish covenant, as the Church of God's people, chosen for great ends which we can but faintly see, and ought to reflect upon with fear, in the clear light which rightly be- longs to it, — if there be truth in it, and if the Scrip- tures be the sacred records of that people so myste- riously dealt with, — ^we shalt expect that the continu- ous records of a Church so circumstanced as was the Jewish, would contain numerous incidental notices bearing testimony t9 a struggling and imperfect state of the early doctrinal truth among the nations in the midst of which the people of the covenant played so wonderful a part. Now to this, the Scrip- ture certainly does bear a large body of testimony. Consider the state of doctrine which is implied in the existence, at the time of Abraham, of a priest of the most high God, such as was Melchisedec, four generations before the typical Aaronic priesthood was instituted in the church of the Jews. It is true that the holy Scripture does but notice Mel- chisedec himself, and we are not informed whether he belonged to a sacerdotal order then existing; but of the holiness of his priesthood there is suffi- cient testimony, in the fact, that the Aaronic priest- hood has ceased, and the Messiah is come a priest after this order of Melchisedec. Abimelech and Pharaoh, each more powerful than Abraham, had sufficient knowledge of religion 152 A VISIT TO THE EAST. to discern him, although a shepherd living in a tent, to be in some mysterious manner more nearly con- nected with God than they were. How remarkable, again, is the whole book of Job, whose religion was anterior to that of Abraham's covenant ! and, how mysterious is the life and character of the prophet Balaam, from Aram in Mesopotamia, equally exter- nal to the covenant of Israel, yet foreseeing that to them would be given the King that should redeem Israel, and that the Star should rise from Jacob ! Here, in the midst of the nations, is a prophet of the true God. The house of Rahab believed in God, and in the fear which fell upon the people of Canaan, afler they heard that Israel had crossed the Red Sea, and after they had crossed the Jordan, God is acknowledged. The Ninevites accepted Jonah as the prophet of God, and repented in sackcloth and ashes at his preaching. Naamau the Syrian acknow- ledges God ; Nebuchadnezzar ,Jiing of Babylon, in the same manner. Cyrus the Persian decreed the build- ing of the house of God, and his successors ratified his decree. The Queen of the East heard of the fame of Solomon as a man of God, and came from the uttermost part of the east to hear his wisdom. And on coming to the Gospel- times, how powerful is the traditionary state of early religious belief! how deeply rooted are the surviving elements of primeval truth which we find there ! There were believing magi who had faith to follow the guiding of a star, and to come to offer gifls to the infant Saviour. There was not found so great faith in Israel as in a Gentile centurion, who loved the nation of the Jews, and built them a synagogue. The woman of Syro- phoenicia had true faith ; so had the Samaritans of Sychem, the Samaritan leper, the Greeks who de- sired to see Christ, — ^all these are incidental proofs of a powerful surviving state of the early Gentile re- CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 153 ligion. Again, the Gentil6 centurion Cornelius was a just man, who feared God with all his house ; and his prayers and alms obtained for him the baptism of the Christian covenant. The above is but a short selection, which any attentive reader of the holy Scripture may multiply at pleasure for himself; and the whole will be made complete by taking into account the great range of testimony embodied in pagan history, which bears the clearest testimony to the existence of sacerdotal orders, possessed of and defending their holy rites and their mysterious doctrines with a strong and powerful religious zeal ; and, indeed, the holy Scrip- ture distinctly recognises their existence, in the me- thod of incidental notices. I think, for instance, the case of Melchisedec, priest and king of Salem, fairly considered, must be taken as a sufficient attestation that the doctrines of primeval religion were formed and embodied into a sacerdotal system, although we know nothing of his predecessors or successors in the priesthood, or how long it continued as a distinct priesthood upon earth. Joseph's father-in-law was a priest of the Egyptian religion, at On; and Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, was priest of Midian ; and certainly neither of these two priesthoods could possibly have been for the service of idols or false gods, else a patriarch and a lawgiver of Israel would hardly have been so nearly connected with them. And, again, when Abra- ham was told, that in the fourth generation his seed should come back to Canaan, for that the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full ; I conceive that their sacerdotal system had not then come to that ripe state of corruption to which their system (for system they had, as appears from incidental notices in the books of the Chronicles) did really sink in the times of Jeroboam and his successors on the throne of Israel. 154 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Abijah, the king of Judah, reproached the people who had revolted with Jeroboam : " Have ye not cast out the priests of the Lord, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and have made you priests after the manner of the nations of other lands ? so that whosoever cometh to consecrate himself with a young bullock and seven rams, the same may be a priest of them that are no gods** (2 Chron. xiii. 9). But perhaps it is throughout the writings of the prophets that the Gentile priesthoods are most dis- tinctly recognised in their real sacerdotal character ; and by them they seem to be addressed as priest- hoods perverted from their primeval purity, and cor- rupted from the service of God to the service of devils, and idols, and them that are no gods. On the whole, we gain some important practi- cal conclusions from the above short survev of the fate of the primeval theology, struggling against the corruptions of human nature, by the instrumen- tality of the Gentile sacerdotal systems. Primeval theology existed at first by the sacerdotal functions of the chief of the family or tribe ; and when polities were afterwards founded upon its doctrines, these appear to have owed their constitution to distinct sacerdotal colleges already existing, with the gift of ordination, of which the Egyptian monuments prove them to be possessed, and the general aspect of pagan history corroborates. By means of these col- leges the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom, was upheld, and the leading doctrines of the early religion practically enforced upon the people ; and, indeed, it is nothing else than the spirit of the primeval theology, deeply imbedded into classic literature, which renders it the valuable source of instruction for Christian youth, which, notwithstand- ing all imaginary grounds of exception, it is found to be in practice. When these colleges became CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS. 155 corrupt ; when the systems of philosophy had run to weed ; and when the Jewish Church was all but extinct, and pagan Rome had extended a coun- terfeit Church-system of Roman citizenship over the known world ; then came the ** Desire of all nations," and a new Church-covenant was given to mankind, together with a system of doctrine, con- taining truth which the primeval theology, as well as the Jewish, could only view by anticipation. The Sacrifice for the sins of the world had not then been offered ; the new and better covenant was not then given ; the kingdom was not come wherein the whole earth was to become a Church unto God ; and there- fore the fear and the love of God, which are the two principles antagonist of human corruption, had to struggle on with such means and powers as God was pleased to permit. And the whole of pagan his- tory has no other key to its meaning than the effi- cacy and fate of the sacerdotal systems, which pro- tected the primeval doctrines now found in the book of Genesis, as well as on the Egyptian monuments. Neither is there any other key to the vast complex system of religious belief now upon earth, except this, of the downward progress of primeval truth, surviving by means of various traditionary sacerdotal systems dispersed over the earth, and by them main- tained in varying degrees either of purity or corrup- tion ; together with such portions of the full truth, revealed to man by Jesus Christ, which different sectarian bodies possess, and of which the Catholic Church is the only bulwark and ordained witness, whose duty and vocation is like ** the candle set upon a candlestick" to give light unto the whole house. The former Church of Jewish Israel, which gave light to the Gentile sacerdotal systems, has now been removed as a Church, and exists only as a tribe under a curse. The Jewish people shine no 156 A VISIT TO THE EAST. longer in the world ; their candlestick is gone ; they are a hissing and a reproach even to the Gentile sys- tems of worship. Their prophet Hosea has fore- told, that ** they shall abide many days without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without a teraphim ;** and their present state, under the rabbinical system of doctrine, which has supplanted the priests of the Lord, is miserable enough : and yet it is curious to observe how many striking points of similarity this rabbinical system now in existence amongst them bears to the system of sectarian doctrine which in Germany, America, and England, has been for three centuries growing side by side with the catholic sys- tem of the apostles. Their main points of resem- blance are, — the same self-election of the teachers ; the same unbounded license of interpretation ; the same subdividing and disuniting tendency of the doc- trine ; itis entire dependence upon, and powerlessness over, the disciple ; and the still more important pa- rallel of result, viz. that the worship of God dwindles under them into something weak and contemptible, if not into an openly profane and extravagant service, utterly destitute of the power and beauty of holiness which the Jewish service possessed in the time of Solomon and of his j^ther David, and which is now become the heir-loom of the Catholic and Apostolic Church alone. The power of the Church-covenant can alone grapple widi the downward tendencies of internal human corruption ; and to this covenant alone belongs the divine gift of unity, in all possible circum- stances, of such a creature as man is. It is the nature of the Church to struggle for unity against the cor- rupt disuniting powers that are arrayed against her. At one time she scarcely survived upon earth, — as, when Elijah prayed that he might die, with the words, " I, even I, only am left ; and they seek my CH. IX.] EGYPTIAN MONtJMENTSf. 157 life to take it away :" and, indeed, she has been ever threatening to perish, though ever maintained by some invisible power. So it has been from the be- ginning. The conflict between theology and human corruption has been carried on, — first, under the patriarchal priesthoods ; subsequently, by distinct sacerdotal colleges, and in the midst of these, and as a light to lighten them, by the Church of the Jewish covenant, to which was given the priesthood, law, and polity, instituted by Moses ; and lastly and finally, it is now carried on over the world by the Apostolic and Catholic Church, to which the sole dispensation of the Gospel is committed. True, that theology has always evinced a cementing power over mankind; a certain portion of Church unity belonged to the primeval doctrines, and that they had a certain power and gift of unity, the polity of Egypt bears witness ; a better and greater gift of the same was given to the Jewish Church ; but the fulness belongs only to the Christian Church. Re- ligion is the only cementing power mankind has known. Atheism is the state of fools, and has been found to lead to the state of devils ; and entire loss of unity will be the last misery of devils. Irreligion and want of unity go hand in hand ; and unity apart from the Church, there is, and can be none, so long as there is an internal principle of corruption in man ; at least, the experience of the past has no other key to its meaning, if this be not granted. CHAPTER X. THE MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIAO. As we have now spent several Sundays in Cairo, and have seen the children who attend the mission- schools at the Sunday-services, we had naturally a great wish to see the school; and on going there were received by the Rev. Mr. Kriise, the mis- sionary, with his usual kindness. The premises con- tain, besides other buildings, two ample and well- populated school-rooms. The details of the system seemed all very complete, and the young Arabs very clean, rosy -faced, well-behaved, intelligent children ; and I could not help envying the beauti- ful Arabic handwriting which many of &em were able to exhibit; not a few of them could read and spell English very well, and seemed to bid fair soon to become amphibious in European and Eastern life. Mr. Kriise now informed us that many of the children were Mahometans; and that several of those whom we had observed among the singers on the Sunday service were so too. We were conducted over the whole establishment ; and certainly, if this kind of process be the true method of converting the heathen, nothing can be more complete than Siese schools : because it is very seldom in Europe, except in the very highest schools, that the grammar of more than one language is taught; but here the pupils are well instructed in two languages, and possess many other proficiencies, besides being capital arithmeticians and excellent scribes. CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 159 However, on going home, the inquiry occurred to me, what has really been done, what has been gained, by the missionary efforts of which so much has been said, written, and reported of late years ? Is a polite education in grammar and arithmetic, the Gospel harbinger and forerunner of Christ ? Surely St. John the Baptist is at least no example of this species of preparation. Nor does it clearly appear, without at all depreciating the value of a polite education, that under the Gospel scheme, scholastic proficiency is a necessary part of the creed and life of a Christian convert. The people of Judea were offended on this very score at Jesus Christ himself: " How knoweth this man letters (said they), having never learned?" and on more than one occasion, afler the resurrection of Christ, the multitudes were astonished at the words of his apostles, as having known them to be " ignorant and unlearned men." Indeed, one of St. Chrysostom*s chief arguments for the truth of the Christian religion is derived from pointing to the great work of the Church spread over so many countries, and originating from the doctrine of men who were known and acknowledged to be '* ignorant and unlearned." We remember the para- ble of the servants, who were commanded to go into the highways and hedges, and bring in the blind, the halt, and the lame ; and we see how this command was in process of being fulfilled by the apostles : " For ye see your calling, brethren (says one apostle, 1 Cor. i. 26), how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called ; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise." Now, without drawing any inference from this, here at least is a discrepancy between our present system of spreading the Gospel and that of the apostles. The Christian religion has clearly an ally in our day, which it wanted in tlie 160 A VISIT TO THE EAST. days of the apostles, — naraely, school-proficiency. The apostles gathered in the halt, and the lame, and the blind, that Christ's house might be filled ; we gather in clever penmen, grammarians, and arithme- ticians. It is a subject of very painful reflection with many thoughtful Christians, that after all the display of zeal the last fifty years have evinced towards the subject of missions, comparatively little has been ef- fected. Numbers of amiable, patient, industrious, single-minded men, have left their homes, chosen a sphere of duty in the midst of hardships and difficul- ties, and, unknown to the world, have nobly done their part in the Christian cause ; and yet what has been gained? The heathen have seen them come, have heard the sound of their discourses, have be- nefited by their charities, have learned to regard them as kind and benevolent friends ; but on their death all is gone. The heathen multitude has been touched, as it were, but not gained, moulded, settled, and grafted into the religion. That this is plain and sad matter of fact, I think scarce even an enthusiast will be hardy enough to deny ; indeed, it is but what is mournfully enough confessed, as a perplexing and disheartening truth, by many who wish it were other- wise, and pray diat the heathen might become par- takers of die same mercy with themselves. Is there not, then, some cause ? Is there not some fatal flaw in our present mode of carrying on the work ? In a word, is the system and method adopted, the true one? In a country where the Church polity and consti- tution of religion already exists, how wonderfully does religious faith appear to be sustained ! Let the clergyman be ever so secularly minded, ever so in- diflerent about his office and duty ; let him exhibit an example of ever so great practical contempt in CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 161 his own person for the precepts of the faith which he is ordained to preach ; yet, in spite of every ad- verse influence, die constitution of religion has a tenure of life superior to all. The power that is in her is greater than that which is against her ; although many stumble on witnessing the iniquity of both the priest and the people, yet nothing can destroy the religion : Christ's witness, once set up, remains until he thinks fit to remove it. But let a missionary leave this country upon the present system, earnest and resolved, knowing to what labours he is called ; let him select his own station; let him establish himself, with his printing-press and assistants ; let him continue his whole life faithfully labouring ; and what, after all, is gained? Take the instance of Schwartz. The chief missionary dies ; the few con- verts and subordinates lose their only bond of union ; the establishment comes to nothing ; the whole falls to pieces, as a piece of burned lime on being ex- posed to the air. And supposing his life to be long £^red, which it seldom is, his success consists in forming personal friendships rather than converts ; and it is a question whether he could transfer his flock to a stranger, with whom they were not per- sonally acquainted, without putting their faith to a very serious risk. In all this there must be some deep-seated eause or causes: for Christ's word is with power, and his Name was not wont to be used in vain by his first servants who spread his religion ; nei- dier is his holy Name now less powerful than it used to be, for with him a thousand years are but as one day. There must therefore be some fatal flaw in our system ; for although they have wanted neither patience, labour, nor zeal, missionary efforts of mo- dern times have proved effete to an extent truly de- plorable. p 2 16^ A VISIT TO THE EAST* I have not myself seen the people of India, nor, indeed, any but the extreme western Asiatics ; if I venture, therefore, to suggest any remarks of local applicability, they belong to the subject only so far as these are fair specimens of their brethren of the same continent, and the missionary systems pursued in Egypt and the Levant, fair specimens of the mo- dern system of missions generally. One chief element of failure appears to be, the absence of a sacerdotal character on the part of our missionaries : a priest, let him belong to whatever perverted form of the primeval faith he may, yet he stands before the people the representative of an- other world, of another social order of life in another world, the servant of some higher and unseen power, whatever character that power may bear, or under whatever disguise that power may be known and worshipped. The heatben, it is clear, do possess priesthoods ; and the constitution of their lives is in- terwoven into their corrupt priestly polities. Unless, therefore, the Christian missionary come armed with the entire sacerdotal system which Christ and his apostles have founded upon earth, and which exists in other countries, he finds a corrupt system arrayed against him, associated with the wants and affections of the peo- ple, and one which they will not desert so long as they see no visible substitute which promises them better. What is really needed in establishments for the con- version of the heathen appears to be, a noble and ade- quate provision for the baptism, confirmation, mar- riage, and burial of the converts, set ministrations for the relief of the sick and aged, and suitable and suf- ficient maintenance for the sacerdotal and liturgic worship of God ; and the whole under that divine regimen which alone possesses the sacerdotal gift of holy orders — the episcopal power of the bishop. Pagan religions, as now existing, are transmissive CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 165 sacerdotal systems, which, in some inadequate mea- sure, do interest the affections of the people, and, by force of hereditary associations, absorb successive generations of people into them. The Christian re- ligion is just as much a transmissive sacerdotal sys- tem in countries where it has long existed as pagan systems are. The difference between them consists in the pagan systems being perverted and incrusted systems of primeval truth, while the Christian sys- tem is that full and perfect gift which God has formed out of men for die benefit of his creatures. Now, the existing pagan systems are evidently in the way of the Gospel, and they must be combated. There is an evident power of fascination in them, which firmly retains the mass of the people, and this must be broken. In order to do this, the modern missionary principle is, to educate children in schools in the usual scholastic attainments ; let them once become proficients in school-knowledge, and they wiU learn to despise the priestly yoke of their coun- try and kindred. Hence a writer upon modem mis- sions, on being compelled to confess, with respect to the whole progeny that has passed through the mis- sion-schools, " that they have not, it is true, become Christian," comforts himself by saying, ** but then their prejudices have been shaken, and the ground has been prepared ;" that is, they have come out of the mission-schools neither Hindoos, Mahometans, Parsees, or Christians, but a young fry without any religion at all. Now if this is hereafler to turn out to the glory of the Christian faith, one thing at least is clear, that the apostles and their successors did not thus prepare the way for Christ's religion, by leading one generation through an introductory course of atheism, in order to the breaking up of the prejudices which might stand in the way of the GospeVs being received by the next. As if the fool who saith in 164 A VISIT TO THE EAST. his heart there is no God, were nearer the Christian religion than the ignorant worshipper, who, accord- ing to his light, feels after God, if haply he might find him. The main body of error in our present system is, however, somewhat difficult satisfactorily to dis- entangle, without recurring to some deep principles to which the late history of missions has been almost an entire stranger. A great practical question is at issue, — whether there be not sufficient remains of vital religion in the hereditary pagan sacerdotal sys- tems to resist any attacks which can be made upon them in tlie scholastic form in which they are now conducted ; and this appears to be at once decided by the experience of the last fifty years, which shews that the system pursued is almost harmless as an aggressive system, and is in itself incapable of bear- ing fruit, for it destroys the imperfect seed of hea- then religion, without any power of maturing and bringing a purer faith to perfection. But, further, is human nature in need or not in need of such a Church-polity as that which we have ourselves inherited ? Is not religion a power, a creed, a rule of life, and a visible communion with other men, under a system of invisible influences ? or will a mere intellectual glimpse of redemption suffice ? Now if the last-mentioned be the end and aim of mis- sions, then certainly schools as at present conducted are the just and true way of practically attaining to it. For the whole system of school-instruction from beginning to end, as far it touches upon religion at all, treats it as a literature, and makes it a mere matter of knowledge. Practically, and as a matter of fact, to the pupils in mission-schools, the articles of the Christian faith are things in which they have just as much heartfelt interest, as we have in the tenets and doctrines of the school of Pythagoras. The re- CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 165 ligion of their hearts is that of their parents, so long, that is, as it survives the information daily sought to be instilled into them, that it is false. And what is the fate of these young people when they come to leave the school ? they are never afterwards seen, their faith in the religion of their parents is shaken, they have had no resdly vital and better one given, only a men- tal form of doctrinal words, rapidly effaced, as a language which is no Ignger spoken, from the only place where it had ever found a reception, viz. the memory. They carry away a very good secular education ; they learn to write, to spell, to cast up accounts, to read both English and Arabic ; and they end by entering into life upon a much higher worldly footing than they entered the school, either as dra- gomen or merchants* clerks, &c., or in some worldly service, where they earn good wages and rise in rank. Now in all this there may be very much philan- thropy, but how much there may be of Christianity and of the spread of the Gospel is another question. Of this it is to be feared there is not much hope. But again, what is the motive which overcomes the prejudices of either heathen or Mahometan parents? for these prejudices, particularly in the case of Ma- hometans, are exceedingly strong. There is a curious struggle, as I satisfied myself by inquiry, between the temptation to take the offer of this worldly ad- vantage, and the necessity of receiving it at the hands of Christians. The power, therefore, which brings the pupil within the proselytising influence of the school, is plainly a secular one, a worldly tempta- tion overcoming the existing scruples of the parent, which some parents have the fortitude to resist^ and some have not; the school being the cause of a good deal of jealousy in the town on this very score. Naturally a parent whose faith has yielded to the overpowering temptations of the school ac- 166 A VISIT TO THE EA8T. complishmentSy is loath to relinquish the hope of being notwithstanding able to obtain them, salvo the sacrifice of the child's former faith ; the lessons of the school are therefore industriously frustrated at home, and between the two the poor child's faith in both home and school religion is for the time deadened ; and when he leaves the school, he is generally taken before the Oolema, or Mahometan priest, and by him not uncommonly terrified into re-embracing his former faith, or if not, he lapses into a character un- happily too common in Egypt, one who practically despises all religion; and thus tlie latter end comes to be worse than the first. Where the school-system is the one adopted by the missionary, this can only be where there is a market for European acquirements, and where their value is known and felt, — in British India this is the case, and also all over the Levant, — for the mission-school has no advantage over a native school, except it be as a means of acquiring Euro- pean knowledge. In order therefore that the school may flourish, an alliance must in the very outset be made with secular temptations, as the readiest coun- teractive to the religious scruples and prejudices of the people, whatever these may be. This ought alone to be fatal to the system, even upon suppo- sition of its being in other points free from ob- jection. But in another essential point the system is false, and that is, the practical treatment of the doctrine of original sin. None of those who deny the doctrine of the Church respecting baptismal regeneration, practically refrain from administering the sacrament, but the generality of these schools proceed with their supposed scriptural mode of training, independent of baptism ; neither is their instruction directed to this sacrament, but it proceeds in the manner of li- CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 167 terature, so that one would rather say the pupil was, in fact, learning as a lesson some points of history belonging to another man's creed, dian imbibing the hopes and fears connected with his own. And lastly, the system is false in one more point of view, wherein it is to be feared it shares its defect with every religious school-system, that this age has been so fruitful in giving birth to. I am not now referring to tlie peculiar doctrines of the Church Catholic system, although history will be found to shew that the Catholic Church has not used school-systems as the first means of conversion and of establishing herself, — I take the matter on die lowest ground. Now it must be granted me, that in every attempt hitherto made to improve man, whether by teachers of philosophy, such as Pytha- goras or Plato ; by poets, such as Orpheus ; or by religions, such as were the creeds brought away by the lonians from Egypt, &:c. — the end has invari- ably been, not knowlec^e, but practice. Even Aris- totle, studying the nature of the human heart, dis- tinctly declares that his object is not knowledge, but practice, riXog oh yvGnnq, aXAa ^pa^tc. If religion is nothing but knowledge, men are not given to con- tend so violently for matter of scientific difference ; for the world has witnessed no internal convulsion of nations or great wars for questions of science, whereas religion has torn nations and families asun- der. Religion, therefore, does enter into the life, and sways the motives and the practice of men; but then, in order to have this effect, religion is not only vital, internal in the heart, a life and energy within, but a definite creed, an intelligible rule, and a visible communion. But the scriptural education of these schools is just as practically unconscious of any influence upon die hearts of the children, as it is of definite articles of faith and ostensible commu- 168 A VISIT TO THE EAST. nion ; it is a mere reading-lesson, tedious and dull in the extreme, involving a great deal of familiarity and irreverence towards the name of God, and as a life-giving exercise perfectly barren. Its end is mere knowledge; it burdens the memory, overloads the brain, wearies the pupil, and does nothing more ! Indeed it is a happy thing when nothing more is done. I am sorry to say the faith which subsisted before often expires in the perplexity occasioned by the difierence of school and home treatment, and the poor pupil is between the two driven into unbelief, from utter inability to make a practical choice of either of the two systems, which are reciprocally endeavouring to extinguish each other. A somewhat remarkable incidental consequence of the late missionary exertions may be observed in the birth of a large and almost new family of litera- ture, "missionary travels," from the ponderous oc- tavo down to the pamphlet report. Now that the public should be interested in the success of endea- vours in which they themselves may in a manner be said to share, is exceedingly natural ; but it is greatly to be feared that this has grown into a litera- ture, more distinguished for its popularity than its truth ; and a visit to the actual places described does, I fear, add but a fresh proof, that the time is still dis- tant when society will give birth to a class of travel- lers strictly speaking the truth. Let me, however, not be misunderstood to speak a word against any of those laborious ill-requited men, of whom we have the simple and unpretending accounts which they themselves furnished to their own friends, and which have since transpired to the public. I am now speaking of a large class of literature, the object of which is to fascinate the public mind, by descriptions that are not real, and the ultimate tendency of which is to create an interest in no degree durable or well CH. X.] MISSIONARY SCHOOLS IN CAIRO. 169 directed.' It is perhaps a misfortune to have seen too much, but my own experience prompts me to say that wary persons will do well not to receive implicitly every story, that has not competent and fair authority to support it. It is quite true that we are indebted for much valuable and veracious information of manners and customs to missionary labour : indeed, a great part of our knowledge of China comes from the mission- aries. And what can be so just and noble a source of information respecting the habits and manners of other people, as the simple chronicles of the self- denying labours of the faithful missionary ? I am inclined to set these almost as far before any other accounts that secular travellers can give, as the Scrip- ture histories are more faithful than their contempo- raries of pagan literature. But I am not speaking of these works ; merely of an abuse which, I fear, will terminate eventually in lowering the importance of the subject in the eyes of the Church at large ; and, at all events, since they do contain much that is really without foundation, and which may give rise to hopes purely delusive, it cannot, on the whole^ be out of place to interpose something in the way of caution, from one whose personal observation has convinced him, that the actual state of missions is far from so promising as the general tone of reports, whether panfiphlets or volumes, would lead their readers to suppose. I fear far more for the effect of missionary schools in the Greek dominions than in Cairo. In Cairo they are comparatively harmless, except to the children themselves, for the pupils lapse into the care of their families, after the instruction is over. They receive the kindest treatment, and there is nothing to bring the Christian religion into direct contempt, except the erroneous system itself, and this is but little seen 170 A VISIT TO THE EAST. or observed ; for the Mahometans have a just sense of conduct that evidently springs from religion, and they justly appreciate the acts of another creed. This is, however, not the case with the other Levant schools, for there the Church-authorities are greatly opposed to them ; and it is painful to any Churchman to witness unauthorised intrusions of clergy whose obedience is due to another bishop, and whose acts are not only entirely without their own episcopal sanction, but cause great pain and sorrow to the Church wherein they intrude. A philanthropic object of bestowing school-tuition in secular acquirements* neither is, nor ought to be, the true labour of the missionary : he has, surely, a higher and more heavenly mission, and one that ought to cease not with the boyhood of those who come to him, and who know him only as schoolmaster, but one which, continuing through life, should end only at death. The evil results, there is but too much reason to fear, are already beginning to be very severely felt; indeed, the little kingdom of Greece contains more of the elements of disunion than any other amount of territory in the world, France herself not excepted ; and this, in no little measure, to be attributed to the school - system, both native and foreign, which teaches religion as a science, and puts it practically upon a common footing with the rest of the school-business, instead of allowing it to take root as a, practical law written in the heart, grafted there by the hand of those upon whom the apostle lays the care of infancy and child- hood when he says, " Ye fathers, bring up your children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." CHAPTER XI. EGYPT AND JEWISH PROPHECY. It is not a little remarkable to find so much more mention of Egypt in the Jewish Scriptures than of Israel on the Egyptian monuments. Jewish figures are here and there found in servile attitudes, grouped together with other captives, in the triumphal sculp- tures. At Benihassan there is represented, in rude but expressive drawing, the entrance into the coun- try of a family, supposed to be that of Jacob. On the southern wall of the temple at Karnac, on one side of the porch is seen the figure of Shiskak, king of Egypt, in a triumphal attitude, threatening seve- ral figures of aged men, who represent the cities he had subdued. Among these stands Rehoboam, king of Judah ; and generally, wherever any notice of Israel does occur, its principal object is to gratify Egyptian pride by some token of the comparative insignificance of Israel. As far as we may judge from this distance of time, Israel appears to have entertained quite a different feeling towards Egypt. Solomon married his queen from Egypt; and, by an act of express disobedience to the command of Moses, furnished his capital and army with horses and chariots from Egypt ; — ^nor have we any traces of ill feeling on the part of Israel towards Egypt, until the reign of the later kings. The little Church of Is- rael then held for some time a trying position between the two great powers of Assyria and Egypt. From the commencement of this period date the series of 172 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Jewish prophecy against Egypt ; and there may now be observed a remarkable contrast between the dis- position of the apostate part of Israel towards the Egyptian power, and that of the faithful remnant which obeyed the warning voice of prophecy. In Israel, at diis time, there were two parties : the one opposed to Egypt upon principle, as a power under the curse and ban of God ; and the other disposed to look for a refuge in Egypt from the captivity to which they foresaw they would, sooner or later, be required to submit at the hands of the Assyrian power. The event justified the prophecy: the Israel that went to Babylon survived to return ; the rem- nant that escaped to Egypt was slain there. This period has given birth to many solemn and striking prophecies respecting the future fate of Egypt, die fulfilment of one of which, in par- ticular, is most undeniably stamped upon the pre- sent face of the land, viz. " They shsdl be there a base kingdom : it shall be the basest of the king- doms ; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations : for I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations" (Ezek. xxix. 14, 15). Of this even chance visitors are agreed, that of all countries Which possess a form of polity, none are so intrinsically base as the people of Egypt. It is the basest of kingdoms, and shall never more exalt itself. It must be confessed that there are in Africa human beings lower in the scale of spirits than the fellah of Egypt or Nubia. The people from among whom the slave-markets are furnished are little more than flesh possessed of the powers of life, and greatly inferior to the stout, healthy, well-made labourer of Egypt. But the prophecy contrasts Egypt with the other kingdoms of the world ; and as such it is now the basest of kingdoms in every point of view in which a travelling observer can look CH. XI.] EGYPT AND JEWISH PEOPHECY. 173 at it ; — ^and if I may conclude a miscellaneous col- lection of memoranda, with a rapid view of the sub- sequent progress of the kingdom, this will also shew that internally, among themselves as a people, the mass of the Egyptians have become, as the prophecy foretells, ** the basest of kingdoms/' The first of your informants shall now be M. Agoub, an academician of Paris of some little noto- riety, whose sketch of Egyptian history, little worth as it may be intrinsically, I am disposed to prefer, on account of his having been personally engaged in the task of modernising many of the present pasha's amphibious Arab pupils into accomplished Parisians ; and from his being known to belong to the school of French philosophers, he is without suspicion as a witness to the truth of the Holy Scripture prophecy. The second shall be the accurate and well-known J. Von Hammer. The sum of M. Agoub's account appears to be, that, under the Persian dominion, which lasted two centuries, an oppressive policy was industriously pur- sued, tending to efface the national character by the removal of their institutions and the injuring of their temples. Under the new usurpers, Uie Ptolemies, the policy pursued was a totally different one. They built new temples to the Egyptian deities, super- seded the old traditionary worship, and, among other changes, introduced their own sdphabet, under the modification of character which still survives in the country, as the current type of the Coptic language.. ** By these means," remarks M. Agoub, " the graces of Ionia came to temper the austere gravity of the Egyptians, and an alliance was formed between science and the muses." The subsequent history of the Ptolemies hardly corresponds witb this descrip- tion. If Soter and Philadelphus were wise and pru- dent princes, Philopater and Physcon were the very Q 2 174 A VISIT TO THE EAST. reverse ; and the Romans found Egypt an easy con- quest in the reign of the well-known Cleopatra, in- troducing themselves first as mediators, and remain- ing as masters — a practice which, he assures us, is the usual result of political protection. " It were to have been supposed," continues M. Agoub, *' that Rome, the mistress of nations, on the eve of the commencement of the Augustan age, would have given a new era to Egypt, and that the people would have seen their Thebes arise from its ruins, with its palaces and its glory." But the Ro- mans, in their conquests, seem to have been very much like ourselves in after ages — too much men of business, to labour for chimeras. They were, therefore, content with carrying away a few of the obelisks, and with sending prefects in return to raise corn and collect the tributes, treating Egypt as a farm. This indifference on the part of the Romans M. Agoub considers to be more reprobate than the ignorance of the caliph who caused the library of Alexandria to be burned. Egypt passed into the hands of the eastern em- pire of Constantinople, on the division of the Roman Empire into east and west ; and although the philo- sopher does not think the matter of sufficient im- portance to mention it, the Church had, by this time, gained considerable root in Egypt ; numerous her- mits had settled in the retirement afforded by the caves on the banks of the river, by means of whose teaching the Christian creed spread among the peo- ple, and more than one gigantic ruin of the ancient system of worship afforded a shelter for the full and complete faith which was now come. The Church and doctors of Alexandria are well known in the history of the Church. Nothing important was now brought to pass until the reign of Omar the caliph, who obtained a complete victory over the forces of CH. XI.] EGYPT AND JEWISH PROPHECY. 175 the Eastern Empire, by which Jerusalem was thrown open to him. He now sent Amrou his general to the conquest of Egypt with four thousand men ; and so extraordinary was his success, that, within nine years after Mahomet's death, the whole of Syria was subjected to the Koran, and Egypt declared a pro- vince of the caliphate. A different era is now begun. The Arabic lan- guage came in, together widi the Koran, and the mass of the poorer people adopted the faith of their rulers. The Christians were obliged to withdraw into Upper Egypt and Abyssinia, leaving only a small portion of their number behind, who still main- tain themselves in a distinct form of Church polity, which, from time to time, has lost many of its mem- bers by defection to the religion of their rulers. The caliphate was, shortly after the times of Mahomet, removed to Bagdad, under the title of the Abassides ; and in the ninth century, Mahadi Obeidallah, a descendant of the family of Ali, who was the fourth in succession from Mahomet, and de- posed from his throne, made a descent upon Egypt ; and his grandson Moez established himself in it, independently of Bagdad, being considered as the founder of the dynasty of the Fatemite caliphs. Moez commenced building Cairo with great activity ; and his enclosure, now that the city has greatly out- grown these linAits, is still called the city of the Arabs. The reign of these princes was very similar to that of all the successors of Mahomet — a mixture of greatness and meanness, of virtues and vices, of mercy and cruelty. History records with honour the eloquence of Mansour, the bravery of Moez, the generosity of Azig, and the wisdom of Mostanser ; while the life of Hakem Biamrillali is in direct con- trast. He was the Nero of his race. He set his capital on fire out of mere freak, and interdicted the 176 A VISIT TO THE EAST. pilgrimage to Mecca, calling himself a prophet. He was in the habit of going up alone to the top of the Mokattam (a rocky range to the east of Cairo), and was one morning found dead there. Adhed, the last caliph of the Fatemite dynasty, had a favourite minister of the name of Noureddin, who was governor of Syria when the Crusaders under Guy de Lusignac gained some successes in that coun- try. When these latter turned their forces against Cairo, and extorted the stipulated payment of an immense sum of money, Noureddin hastened to send Cherkouk from Syria, with an immense force, as the Crusaders thought, to his master's relief. This be- lief so alarmed them, that, before Cherkouk arrived, the enemy was gone ; and Adhed, delighted with the activity of his friend, made him his grand vizier, and, at his death, placed his nephew in the same office. This was no other than die renowned Sala- din. Saladin, not content with the station of grand vizier, conceived the design of seizing the caliphate to himself. He accordingly laid the foundation for his design by talking of the propriety of restoring Egypt to the house of the Abassides. By this means he gained their influence, and, supported by his old master Noureddin, he leisurely took measures to secure the power into his own hands. Adhed, all the while, was ignorant of his designs ; and being a short while aflerwards confined to his palace by a long sickness, he died, unconscious of the intended treachery of his minister. Saladin took the favour- able moment, seized the citadel, and proclaimed himself Sultan of Egypt. Saladin appears to have been a great warrior, and no legislator. M. Agoub has selected two anecdotes of him : — That an inhabi- tant of Jerusalem once cited him before the cadi ; and that, instead of taking offence at this boldness. ca. XI.] EGTPT AKD JEWISH PftOPHBCY, 177 he appeared in plain clothes, and pleaded his cause in person on die appointed day ; and having gained it by great eloquence, he made handsome presents to the man, and dismissed him welt satisfied. On an- other occasion, in full divan, a woman came with a petition, which Saladin at ihe time refused to exa- mine ; but upon overhearing her exclaim, " Why should he be our king, if he will not be our judge T" he was so struck with the Justice of the remark, that, suspending all other proceedings, be decided the cause to her satisfaction. The descendants of Saladin are known by die name of the Ayoubite Sultans, so called from his father Ayoub ; but this dynasty had no long dura- tion. The Mamlouks, who take their rise about this time, composed of slaves purchased from Georgia ] 78 A YI8IT TO THE EAST. and other countries, had been formed into a body of cavaby about the sultan ; and from them there rose a dynasty which continued until the conquest of the country by Selim, sultan of the Turks. The next short extract occurs in the great work of J. Von Hammer, History of the Turkish Empire. ** After the empires of the Pharaohs, of the Pto- lemies, of the Romans, and of the Byzantines, had passed away, the pyramids witnessed eight succes- sive dynasties roll by, and sink into the dust at their feet, within a space of eight hundred years. The caliphs of the houses of Omnias and Abbas governed it by viceroys, from among whom, two Turks, Tulun and Aschid, were each the founders of short-lived dynasties. The Fatemites then erected a caliphate in E^ypt (909-1171), independent of that at Bagdad ; and they of the Nile and the Tigris con- tended, as rival emperors, and rival imaum, for the sovereignty of Islam. Saladin the Great laid the foundation for the power of his own family, but scarcely for a century (1171-1254), when the first Mamlouk from the body-guard who had power to raise himself to the throne snatched the reins of government out of the hands of the last of the Ayoubides. After the Mamlouks of the Sea, there followed the dynasty of the Tscherkessides, whose last sultans were Chansu Chawri and Tuman Beg. '* Egypt, bounded on the west by the desert, on the north and east by the sea, has nothing to fear from the south but the invasion of the Abyssinians, and from the north-east but that of the rulers of Syria, through the neck of land which unites Africa to Asia. From the south all warlike invasions had ceased for many centuries, and nothing but caravans laden with ivory and gold came from dience ; but the danger of an hostile attack on the Asiatic side had ever remained the same; and the possession of Syria CH. XI.] EGYPT AND JEWISH PROPHECY. 179 had ever been deemed by the rulers of Egypt to be indispensable to the safety of their own dominions. Syria, on this account, was soon made to feel the supremacy of Egypt, at one time partially, at ano- ther entirely ; and on this account the sovereigns of Egypt came into so many hostile collisions with the Asiatic powers that threatened Syria. Not to men- tion the swarms of Persian and Assyrian invaders who rushed in streams over Syria into Egypt ; not to mention the many wars between the successors of Alexander, the Ptolemies, and the Seleucidae ; Syria and Egypt were, under the Arabian empire, each in their turn, a continual mark for the ambition of the several rulers, the moment they ceased to be united under the sceptre of the Abassides. The crusaders, as lords of Syria, were in constant war with the sultans of Egypt of the family of Ayoub. St. Louis, in 1250, as prisoner, was witness to their overthrow, and to the establishment of the new dynasty of the Mamlukes of the Nile. The two greatest sovereigns of this line secured their power in Egypt by con- quests in Syria, the one by driving out the Mongols, and destroying the strongholds of the Assassins ; the other by taking away Laodicea, Tripolis, and other cities, from the crusaders ; so that nothing more remained in their possession but Ptolemais and Tyre, which were reduced by his son Chalil. Thus was Syria, after two hundred years* usurpation by the crusaders, once more cleared of Franks ; and from this time, with the exception of the inroad ofTimur, in the uninterrupted possession of the Mamlouks of the Nile, and then from 1 332 in that of the Tscher- kessides, whose power lasted only 134 years. " The battle of Ridania (22d January, 1517) gave Egypt into the hands of the Turks, exactly a month from their leaving Damascus. On the 31st of January the army of the Turks entered Cairo ; 180 A VISIT TO THE EAST. and on the 13th of April the last of the Mamlouk sultans, the brave and upright Tuman Beg, was hanged at Cairo, at the gate of the SuweOa." The policy now pursued by the Turks shews some knowledge of the craftiness necessary in political measures. The power of the Matnlouks was not destroyed, but left in such a state that it might be a counterpoise to that of the pasha placed there by the porte. Lest his distance from die seat of empire might tempt him to make himself independent, a council of twenty -four, with the title of bey to each member, was formed from them, with power to delay any objectionable measure of the viceroy until the pleasure of the sultan could be ascertained. This species ofgovermnent continued more or less entire up to the French invasion, when the Mamlouk force was almost broken up, by the defeat they sustained from the French ; and since the French invasion Egypt has been doomed to groan under the exac- tions and experiments of another usurper, the pre- sent pasha, who destroyed the last remnant of the Mamlouks by a treacherous massacre. CH. XI.] EOTPT AND JEWISH PROPHECY. 181 Up to the present time, therefore, Egypt has never known a native prince : it has groaned under the dominion of strangers : there has been no more a prince of the land of Egypt, according to the pro- phecy (Ezekiel xxx. 13), and it has been and is the basest of kingdoms. H CHAPTER Xir. THE DESERT. So unusual a superscription as that of the Holy City^ tells its own story of our safe passage over the desert, and return to the abodes, so called, of civilised life. Perhaps you may be surprised at hearing a scion of European civilisation express re- gret at having bid farewell to the life of the desert ; and yet, with all its disadvantages, to which, it must be confessed, that the European mind is naturally sensitive, there is so inexpressible a charm in the life we have just quitted, as to leave on my mind a very great regret that it is over, perhaps for ever. Doubt- less all we have seen is really a very rude, degeaae- rate, and corrupted picture of the simple dignity of the patriarchal life, to which was granted the privi- lege of converse with beings so infinitely higher than we are. And yet, rude as the Bedouin customs are^ they are relics and survivors of those days ; and it may possibly be, that, with such testimonies before the eye, the traveller's thoughts are insensibly carried back to the early purity and simple character of the pastoral life which the patriarchs led : and when he finds himself surrounded with the memorials and associations of far other times, he has leisure to forget the many " inventions'' by which human life is adulterated in Europe, and his mind seems to realise, and for a moment to rest upon, a nearer ^ The papers from which the ensuing narratiTe is taken were written in Jerusalem during a stay of several weeks. CH. XII.] THE DESERT. IBS vision of the peace and innocent purity which our race has lost. Under these circumstances you will not wonder at my saying, that the first feeling, upon a sudden return to the haunts and ways of town- dwelling men, partakes of the oppressive sense, which the atmosphere of a sick room may be supposed to convey to one entering it, in fresh health and spirits, from the evening breeze of a summer sunset. Time and many generations have certainly brought^ the families of Adam-s flesh and blood into singular diversities of social life ; but, notwithstanding, an observer of human ways, wheresoever he may be, is never at a loss for his first principles ; and however the people of one country may seem, in their own eyes, to have outdone those of another land in the race of civilisation which they have set themselves to run, yet, independent of the truth which the Scripture declares, that they all go to one place, '* the dust returning to the dust,'' a common observer at once detects the broad marks of humanity, which stamp Alewin, Nubian, Egyptian, and European, as members of one vast family, whose hearts and dis- positions are as much alike as their self-chosen ways are different. Bodies and societies of men either coin for themselves their own habits of social life, or, what is far more common, they rest satisfied with the current coin, such as they have found it, on being bom into this world; and, happily for its peace, the multitude of men are not in general agitated with an innovating spirit. The more vir- tuous and peaceful they are, the more they are dis* posed to acquiesce, in taking, giving, and transmitting, the system, tone, and habit of social life which they find established. Here and there, now and then, in the world's history there have appeared daring and restless spirits, who have made it their business, day and night, to uproot and subvert the smooth and 184 A VISIT TO THE EAST. sure current into which the multitude is disposed to subside ; and these are a chief part of those workings in which the great universal moral and intellectual movement of this lower world consists^ resolving itself, when followed to its source, into the Christian doctrine of the conflict of good and eviL Men in general, as seen by a traveller, are parts of one vast, fluctuating, diverse social system, which is maintained in a state of movement by the unwearied efforts of the few, it being generally impossible to assign any reasonable motive, or, indeed, to account for them upon any other supposition than that they are the natural fruits of the restless and insatiable energies with which some minds are visited. In the midst of this vast diversity, it will be ob- served that an European will generally claim for him- self the post of honour in the race of civilisation ; and even among the families of Europe, there is often no inconsiderable jealousy, as to whom the palm of civilisation is justly due. A Russian adjudges it to himself, on the score of his aptitude to imitate and appropriate the excellences of all. An Englishman on the score of his contempt for every thing but his own. Each, for his own peculiar reasons, looks upon his own name and people as justly the first : and so it is throughout the tribes of the earth. A Nubian, who daubs his head with daily applica- tions of castor oil, is unconscious of the European's supremacy over him in the matter of civilisation. Say what you will, each will adjudge the prize to his own way of life ; and you may as soon wash the Ethiopian white, as induce him to change his belief. You are not, therefore, to smile at my notion of preferring for a time the life of the de- sert to your civilised ways of Europe, except you are prepared to define in what your civilisation consists, and what its primary elements are. Now, CH. XII.] THE DESERT. 185 let US ask, is there any thing of inherent and in- trinsic excellence in them? Set before an Ale- win chief a picture of European life, — of its study and minute, inquiry — its vast magnitude of labour to produce great mechanical works — the wonderful perplexities and intricate properties of its social in- tercourse — the unwearied labour of mind and body which characterises all its movements — the iron inflexibility of feature and purpose, with which its business, and even its pleasures, are pursued — the endless maze of subjects which employ its thoughts ; —^suppose the chief to contrast this with the firm moral control which he holds over his own handful of people — their hardy habits, their healthy and labo- rious life, their reasonable activity in fulfilling the work, such as it is, which lies before them, — and then fairly judge, if he is not at least as wise as the European, in adhering to his own system of things. To assume a name is practically what logicians term SL petitio principiij and no argument ; although to per- sons who acquiesce in the established signification of names, the mere pre-occupation of the term *• civi- lised," as appropriate to the European system, con- tains a sufficient condemnation of the order of life which the Alewin chief accounts infinitely preferable to any. We are to understand each other, there- fore, if we now differ, as dividing upon the question. What is the inherent exceUence of civilisation ? and whether or no it is a mere chameleon term, signify- ing that particular social order of things most agree- able to the mind of the person who uses it. Were each family of mankind and each class of society satisfied with an exclusive, an unambitious enjoyment of its own social system, how tranquil, if not happy, would the world's course be ! Were each rank, class, order, and division of life content with its own self-adjudged superiority, how harm- k2 186 A VISIT TO THE EAST. lessly and amicably all would co-exist ! Men would quietly come'and cease from the earth ; there would at least be an absence of all storm and violence, if not an uniform and undisturbed peace. But then it appears that there is an element in men's minds, whencesoever its origin, which loathes a calm ; for go into whatsoever society of men you will, you will always find some busy sowing the seeds of practical principles, for ends more or less clearly apprehended by themselves. This spirit is the leaven of all society, and its origin is among the mysteries which are not given to man to see or know ; but all observers |^of the ways of men know it but too well in its effects ; and He who alone knew what was in man, and needed not that any man should tell him, has severely rebuked it in the character in wliich it exhibited itself among the Pharisees : " Ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte; and when ye have gained him, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves." At the same time, it is equally true that **he who winneth souls is wise ;" and we are not to understand that our Lord's words condemn the spirit of proselytising altogether, for he himself sent his apostles to this very end and work ; but that this energy in man, which had before his com- ing moved in the dark, should henceforward partake of the character of good or evil, be attended with a blessing or a curse, accordingly as it should acknow- ledge or deny him, and should tend to promote or frustrate that great work which he came to perform, viz., the gathering together the families of mankind into one visible fold, his catholic Church. From the time that the Son of God became manifest in the flesh, every proselytising spirit has been placed in a position before unknown to men, viz. : ^* He that is not with me is against me ; he that gathereth not with me scattereth." The Messiah thus revealed CH, XII.] THE DESERT. 187 has become a captain and leader over all that dar- ii^ reckless energy in man, which otherwise might have been misled to the service of Satan ; and it is in this sense, among others, that he is called in the New Testament the Captain of our salvation, as training, forming, and moulding, to the sanctifying purposes of his own kingdom, those mighty 'ener- getic spirits, which, under the guidance of the author of evil, had filled the earth with deceit, malice, and violence. Here, then, we have our view of the only true constituent element and first principle of civilisation. Does it own Jesus Christ as its audior ? does it bear his image and superscription ? If not, it is counter- feit coin, however specious. Except you will plead on behalf of the existing social system of Europe, — which few will now venture to do, — that it is essen- tially and vitally Christian^ I must be allowed to say, that, for any thing I can see to the contrary, the habits, manners, diet, and conversation of an Alewin scheick, are as much entitled to respect as those of any. European whatsoever, setting aside all claims on the part of either to a Christian character. The one is as generally estimable as the other ; and the term " civilised" is no more than a pre-occupied name, without a shade of inherent propriety, respect** ing which it may fairly be presumed, as in the fabled reply of the lion to the sculptor, — If we had made the statue, the lion would have been uppermost. Indeed, it is somewhat difficult to appreciate a su- periority which, however gravely expounded, would hardly fail to excite a smile in those over whom it should be claimed. I may therefore, after all, be not so unreasonable in imagining that diere are rudi- ments of true civilisation to be found even in the ways and customs of the desert, as well as in those of Europe ; for if the doctrine oi. Christ be the true civilising power, and the Cbris^an Church the last and perfect form of social life to be given to man, then, surely, the life of the desert, which over&ows with memorials of the patriarchal times, the seed of the Chriitian covenant, approximates as nearly, to say no more, to the true standard of civilisation, as do those many inventions, with which the restless wit of Europeans has diversified their own manners and But to proceed. On the second of March, IS^O, we quitted Cairo, with a company of nine camels and their attendants, under the care of a fine wea- ther-beaten and tolerably honest Arab sheick, Snlei- CH. XII. J THE DESERT. 189 man Menghyn, of whom we grew very fond. There is great difficulty every where in the East to bring about the first actual movement. The whole genius of the people sets so entirely towards the beatitude of rest, and it is so difficult to start, that the sight of the first camel rising with his burden is an inex- pressible relief, especially when the company have been long harassed with preliminary thoughts respect- ing what may and may not be necessaries during a considerable period of absence from the European luxury of shops, and are now stunned by the Babel- converse of Janissaries, servants, camel -drivers, and donkey-boys, who infest the scene of packing. When, therefore, the last camel rises to follow in the wake of the rest, the effect is as the sound of an acquittal to a prisoner on trial for his life. It is needless to give you an account of our stores — they were simple enough : flour, rice, coffee, tea, sugar, macaroni, some dried apricots, figs, and a little wine and brandy. On a journey of this kind, a traveller can hardly study simplicity too much ; and if what is meant when Europeans speak of creature comforts, be indispen- sable to happiness, it is far better for him to turn his steps elsewhere — let him seek Italy, or some other land of " Rosy abbots, purple as their wines." If he be misguided enough to come here, he will but subject himself to the misery of murmuring, for the fish, and the leeks, and the onions of Egypt, and of indulging in disappointment, where he ought to think and speak with nothing but awe and wonder. We rode the well-known street-donkeys to the gate of the town leading to Suez, the Bab el Nasr, or Gate of Victories ; and there we found our sheick, with the dromedaries, waiting for us in person. The old man seemed in high spirits at the idea of revisit- 190 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ing his home and tents, and of once more escaping from the vicinity of houses, while we were somewhat engrossed with the thoughts of mounting. The move- ment occasioned by the camel on rising is at first a little perplexing to a European ; the hinder legs having four joints, the animal, in raising them» throws the rider forward, then backward, and, lastly, forward again, against which motions of the beast, a certain counterpoise is absolutely indispensable ; and some practice is required before this becomes easy ; at first it is awkward enough. Our firiend Mr. W was so unhappy as to stumble in the first trial, from the inattention of the driver, who allowed the beast to rise too soon. In more super- stitious times, this might have been justly taken as an omen ; for we were compelled soon afterwards, on his falling ill at Suez, to dissuade him firom ven- turing upon so rough a journey, so far from medi- cine and the possibility of taking due precaution. At last we were safely mounted, and slowly ad- vanced about a couple of miles beyond the last of the tombs of the caliphs — noble, striking monuments of the heyday of the Mahometan ^th ; and then we came to a halt, where we found our tent ready pitched, and were soon introduced to the new life we were about to lead. The scene we had now to observe was scarcely less than a specimen from another world. About two or three hundred Arabs, from the peninsula of Mount Sinai, were seated in different small groups, with their wives and chil- dren; their entire household stuff, the sacks and other furniture of the camels, disposed by each little party around the spot they had chosen. They were collected in little societies round a smouldering fire of withered roots and scanty bushes picked up from the desert; and some in each little assembly were pounding coffee, or preparing the simple evening CH. XII.] THE DESERT. 191 meal of porridge made of coarse flour, or getting ready cakes of thick paste, to be baked under the ashes. Not a single person appeared to have a tent ; and their only protection at night consisted in such scanty shelter as their little stock of baggage, piled up in the form of a wall against the wind, could give ; scarce more than one or two possessing a sort of cloak which is not unlike a Scotch shepherd's plaid. As we saw them seated round their fires, and close by them their camels, for whom they seemed to have a true friendship, quietly eating their even- ing provender, it was impossible to abstain from the reflection. These men are perfectly happy in the way of their forefathers ; they scorn the bondage of a house ; they are close to a town where every luxury of oriental life overflows ; and yet they have scarce a wish even to know it. If they do come into the town in the daytime, they never stay all night in it. They must have business which makes it necessary to enter, or otherwise they avoid it ; and when they do come, it is always as a Be- douin. Now, with Europeans it is a very common ambition, to bedeck themselves with oriental finery the second day of their arrival ; and from time to time, strange metamorphoses, to which Ovid alone could do justice, are the result. Red trousers, a yellow waistcoat, a blue jacket, and scarlet belt, with cap and sabre, ornament the newly fledged oriental tyro. But a Bedouin has a better self-respect : he aims at no borrowed grandeur ; he is never other than a Be- douin — the untamed and untameable son of Ishmael, with his leathern belt for his knives, his stumpy sword, his shawl-turban, and on high occasions his red gown. These Bedouins, it appears, come from their hills to be employed as carriers, this being their ancestral employment (Gen. xxxvii. 25); and all 192 A VISIT TO THE EAST. that they . earn, which is little enough, contributes to add a few simple luxuries to" the tent — tobacco, cofTee, and some articles of dress, a few glass beads, &c. 1 have often thought, that they have the true secret of life much more than we : I mean, that the restless spirit now afloat in Europe, which takes the existing current estimate of the day as a present standard progressing towards perfection, shews less wisdom than the life of the Bedouin, who is happy in the way that his father was happy, and who, being really happy, has a just contempt for innova- tions of which he could not be so sure. The differ- ence of the two tempers is clear when they come into contrast. I am speaking of them as tempers ; not that I suppose that we are capable of enjoy- ing Bedouin life. Their enjoyment consists in its being tlieir hereditary life. We have an hereditary life, as both Churchmen and Englishmen; and we might learn a lesson from the Bedouin, not to de- sert it. There was something so very interesting in this strange specimen of Arabian life so suddenly pre- sented to us, that it was some time before I had any curiosity to visit the interior of our own tent, al- though pitched close by, and destined to be our only habitation for at least thirty days, moreover a kind of dwelling to which we were total strangers. Our European dread of the difficulties and discom- forts of tent-life were] agreeably disappointed by our finding a warm thick carpet of camel's hair neatly spread over the Jtoor^ each mattrass rolled up at the head of a Turkish rug, a little table in the middle with a couple of camp-stools ; while the door opened upon a blazing fire, near which our servant Moham- med Ali, in the gay dress and peculiar turban of Mocha, of which he is a native, was preparing our evening coffee. He was assisted by two of the CH. XII.] THE DESERT. 193 senior camel-drivers, venerable steady men, whom we afterwards found great reason to respect as solid, sober-minded attendants. All the plague and embarrassment of preparing for a month's absence from shops, which I firmly believe to be a primary constituent of European civilisation, was over, together with the labour of foreseeing and providing against what might hap- pen; the din and the cries of the town were no longer heard ; the evening was quiet and still : and thus we were left the more at peace, to meditate upon the prospect before us. The very scene was a kind of foretaste of the life that awaited us. Here were we in the midst of that singular tribe of the human race, the wild Arab of the desert, into whose country we were about to penetrate, and whose manners are now, after the lapse of more than three thousand years, nearly what they were in the first days of the Bible- history. There was something inspiring in the thought of having left behind the last haunt of ordinary life, and in the notion of trusting ourselves to these wild men, for the sake of visiting scenes connected with the days of their forefathers, and with the Hebrew people, and with the great and mighty works of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The very air of the desert seemed to be scented with genuine free- dom. Around us was the wide land, without a trace of man's handiwork — an absence of all tokens of the conventional manacles imposed by polite life. No longer surrounded with unhappy spiritless Egyp- tians, but with the free uncontrolled descendants of an ancient race whose antiquity runs back to the earliest times of the Bible, and whose country has never known more than a passing invader, — all was new; and the prospect of unknown grandeur seemed to fill the mind, and all things conspired to make this 194 A VISIT TO THE EAST. a very memorable evening, which cannot soon be for- gotten. There was novelty, too, in the idea of being ourselves about to try the actual experiment of a pa- triarchal life, though I fear upon many points of diet and occupation the similitude may hardly hold. On looking around, we found that we were to have two countrymen for associates, who had pitched a t^t close to us ; and later in the evening an Italian gen- tleman from Venice came up to the encampment Now, lest you should imagine that Bedouin life has become my standard of social intercourse, I must relate an incident not a little calculated to destroy the enchantment, and to give a turn to the romantic visions which we might have begun to entertain : — We were bound by our agreement to pay, at start- ing, 100 of the 230 piastres for which we had hired each camel, and accordingly sheick Suleiman came to receive it in the tent. No sooner had he gone away than he commenced portioning it out to his men, the different owners and drivers of the camels. I suspect that many other divisions of the same kind must have been going on too, for there ensued a noise and objur- gation among the whole set, that had the entire tribe been raising a war-shout, it could hardly have been greater. I was afterwards told that this was merely their accustomed usage whenever a division of money took place ; that it meant nothing more than an in- timation, that they were quite prepared to detect any attempt to cheat them, from the suspicion of which they seem to be by no means free, even in transac- tions among themselves. It may be remarked by the way, before we leave Egypt, that there exists in Cairo a numerous pro- fession {servitori di viaggio), lately called into exist- ence, since it became the high road to India. It is no uncommon thing to find among them persons speak- ing three European languages — English, Frendi, and CH. XII.] THE DESERT. 195 Italian, and often the Turkish, in addition to their own. The ability with which they execute their office, which is one requiring a great deal of activity and no little versatility of talent, is, I am sorry to say, &r more conspicuous than either their honesty or good behaviour. It is melancholy, that wherever die aborigines of any country come in contact with the civilisation of Europe, it is certain to corrupt them ; and perhaps a more generally dishonest set of men are not to be found, even in Italy, than these same Europeanised servitori. The Greeks are clever enough as servants, but honesty is with them almost as rare as with the Egyptians : perhaps, on the whole, a party travelling over this route will find that a native of Malta is better adapted to a European master; for he is a semi- Arab by birth, and among them may be found some really excellent conscientious men ; and, in- deed, I am inclined to think that the comfort and even utility of the journey depend so entirely upon the servant, tliat any sacrifice whatever, short of giving up the whole, is not too much to ensure the assistance of an honest, intelligent, and active ser- vant. But where are such to be found? — they are few ; and, I fear, neither in Egypt nor in Greece. CHAPTER XIII. THE CARAVAN ROUTB TO SUEZ. But to resume our journey from Cairo. — How little correct is the idea we can form of the desert from individual descriptions, and how little accurate is the one preconceived at home ! A home notion of the desert I conceive to be generally that of a vast sandy plain scorched by the sun, next to impassable from its burning heat and thirst, swept by siroc winds, with- out either herbage or wells of water, where whole caravans are in a moment overwhelmed by moving pillars of sand and dust, and by whirlwinds : and as far as inquiry enables me to judge, the deserts south of Tunis and Tripoli do somewhat answer to this description. But no such thing at all is true of the desert over which our route to Akaba lay ; for hardly in any one part of Europe could the same variety of scenery be found within the same space. It is nothing but a homespun imagination which has invested the desert with a character for sameness. While we were on the banks of the Nile, both in Egypt and Nubia, we generally made it our even- ing's amusement, whenever tiipe permitted, to climb to the top of any neighbouring rock there chanced to be, for the sake of the view into the interior of the country : though it may be fair to question whether all would have called the scenery pleasing, none, I am sure, could dispute its variety. At one time a dark, precipitous, craggy confusion of rock CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 197 and ravine, varying in outline, and of every hue, from pale sandstone to a deep red, and even lava blackness, would present itself: now and then the sides of the rocks would be shining as if the dross of an iron furnace had been poured over them, mak- ing the scene desolate beyond conception ; at another time, open cavities dotted with palm-trees, terminated by sweeping undulations of ground, here and there touched with a faint tinge of green ; then abrupt rocks surrounded by slopes ; and gradually, as we come nearer to the Mediterranean, these are suc- ceeded by a more open country, intersected with broad winding valleys, covered with tufts of pale wi- thered grass, interspersed with remnants of the dried roots of former shrubs. The caravan route to Suez has now become so entirely a high road for European trafBc, that an at- tempt to describe it may be taken by many in the light of an elegy upon a turnpike ; yet it is a line of route of some note, and you at least will be interested in some description of it. In general it passes over level ground, and is far less varied than the subse- quent part of the journey ; yet do not suppose that it wants its variety, for in no part of the desert is there sameness. The number of whitened camel-bones that literally encumber the road betoken from what im- memorial time it has been the highway of merchan- dise. The first day's march is certainly a practical dis- comfort, greatly tending to dispel the bright vision of patriarchal life» We were called before six o'clock, and were allowed a very small portion of water for the toilette ; to which succeeded a hasty breakfast of bis- cuit and black coffee. The roaring of the camels, the bustle of the servants, the expedition of packing, — all reminded us of the scene of the day before in starting ; and lastly, the striking of the tent became a final signal for our own removal. For the sake of s2 198 A VISIT TO THE EAST. a little exercise, before the heat of the day set in we generally walked on foot for a few miles, and found it to be a great relief during the long nine or ten hours' uninterrupted march. Each camel as it is loaded rises and moves off spontaneously into the track, which from long habit it knows as well as its mas- ter, and it often takes quite an hour before the lag- gers behind accumulate into one uniform marching company. Two miles and three quarters per hour, as nearly as we could judge, appears to be the pace at which we advanced, although the dromedary's pace, if required, will exceed ten and even twelve miles an hour ; but few European tyros would enjoy the experiment of this speed for any length of time. I cannot say what elephant-riding may be, but the dro- medary is undoubtedly the roughest riding I have ever known. Its powers of endurance far surpass those of the horse ; — an Arab riding an express will go sixty miles a day for some days together ; and the distance of eighty miles, between Suez and Cairo, has been crossed in less than fourteen hours by a dromedary now in the Pasha's stables. Our first day's encampment was on the side of a gentle slope covered with shrubs, and even a sort of herbage; for the abundant rains of the winter and spring seasons give birth to a kind of meadow herbage in the early part of the year. There are a great num- ber of good tufls of pale yellow grasses, of which the camels seem fond, all scattered up and down, and growing in the water-courses; but as the summer advances they wither. By the time we came to our evening's encampment we were completely knocked up ; for the first experiment of camel-riding is very tiring. The rider's position upon the animal is not unlike that of an inverted pendulum, which rocks about not less than 40,000 times in the course of the day — sufficiently severe work for beginners ; CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 199 yet, the rest, the well-earned rest of the evening, is an abundant reward for the hard work of the day. To sit in the tent-door in the cool of the evening, to watch the strange figures of the camels wandering near the encampment, and the groups of men round their different fires ; to hear the voice of the sheick in deep converse with the servant, and the little buzz of life immediately surrounding us on the broad face of the great silent wilderness, is a real pleasure, afler the heat and fatigue of the day. Nothing tends to pro- duce such hearty companionship as the being together on the desert. In civilised life firiendship is in a great measure merged in mere acquaintance, and the con- ventional forms of language leave one very much in the dark about real friends; but fellow travellers on the desert sensibly feel the value of mutual kind- nesses, and their positive dependence upon each other. I even know an instance where a sudden violent al- tercation was carried so &r as to cause that utter abomination of civilised life, a duel, to be for a mo- ment talked of, and a challenge to be given and ac- cepted; but the desert interposed, and in a little while reconciled and made very good friends of the would-be combatants. It was impossible to be long at enmity on the desert. The evenings we have sat in each others' tents quietly smoking the chi- book, discoursing of other countries and our own, are little strongholds of past recollection that can never be lost And now for a word in defence of what may seem to English ears entering with violence into customs, which, to say the least, have no patriarchal authority : — a pipe is the key-stone and corner-stone of eastern life. But do not suppose it to have any kindred with the pipe of Germany. In Germany a stranger is liable to be stifled by a pipe in the in- terior of an eilwagen ; or may be lost in a supper* 200 A VISIT TO THE BAST. room, like a fisherman in a fog, or may be unable to recognise a friend when he shakes hands with him, as if in a cavern ; and the natural exclama- tion is — "Oh, this nasty smoking!'' But in the East, without the chibook there would be neither friendship nor afiPection. If two brothers meet after an absence of years, the first words are to ord^ pipes ; it is then time to inquire after each other's health. I met in Constantinople accidentally some young Turks who liad come with me down the Da- nube, and had been studying the German language in Berlin : " Ach, wie geht's?" said I, on meeting; on which a venerable old man with a silver beard, ob- serving that we were acquainted, cried out, " Chi- book," i.e. bring pipes. The pipe enters into friend- ships, advice, bargains, discourse, meditations : it is the Arab's vade-mecum, his companion, his adviser, and comforter — ^he is never without it, and a pipe and a cup of coffee is almost all he requires to make him happy. A European, therefore, must learn to like a pipe, if he goes into the East ; and, indeed, there is an aptitude in the air and climate, which renders it nothing more than a transitory habit, the passing penalty of a wandering curiosity. The following day, about twelve o'clock, there set in upon us one of the siroc winds of the desert, not at first very violent, but after a while increas- ing to a little hurricane. When first it came on, we were close to the well-known pilgrim's tree, cm which the returning Hadj hang up certain parts of their pilgrim robes, in testimony of their having been permitted to return safely from their devo- tional labours ; as, in pagan times, shipwrecked sail- ors who escaped from death used to hang up their shipwrecked clothes in the temples of Neptune. It must be, from all appearances, some years since this tree produced a green leaf; and it presents the CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 201 singular spectacle of a perfect tree, full of minute branches, quite dry, and annually shooting forth this strange foliage at the period of the Hadj's return. There were still, when we passed, many remains of the particoloured productions of the past year. We were glad to take shelter for some time, until the baggage camels had all gone past; for the sand that the wind stirred up was so very sharp and piercing, that it was hardly possible to face it; the camels themselves were compelled to march in a queer way, with their heads doubled up, as poultry in a farmyard dispose of their faces when they go to sleep. It was accompanied by such a parching irritating dryness, that on arriving at our encampment, one of our companions fainted, and for some time we hardly expected him to be able to proceed to Suez on the morrow. Though this was but a faint notion of the true siroc wind of the desert, I never remember to have experienced before the same leaden heaviness of atmosphere, the same difficulty of breathing, and intolerable dry heat — it was, as one of the servants afterwards said, ^^ plenty had like one oven," The next morning our sick companion appeared recovered, and able to proceed; and I rode on to commit a young intelligent servant, named Ali, into the fangs of Turkish justice, for some petty robbery of which he had been guilty the day he left our service with an excellent character. We had parted with him from his being considered too young to cross the desert with us. Turkish law is summary enough: the youth was apprehended, and the go- vernor of Suez, on hearing of his offence, ordered him to be put in prison, where he remained nearly two days, and was then, to my great disturbance, released. When the camels came up, our sick companion 202 A VISIT TO THE EAST. found himself unable to proceed ; and we had him removed to an hotel frequented by East Indian passengers, and put to bed. Most happily, as we were beginning to be anxious on his accoimt, not knowing in any way how to treat him, there drove up to the door a carriage and four horses, bringing two acquaintances, whom we expected soon to follow us, and together with them a gentleman, whom, at first sight, we took for a French ofHcer in the Pasha's service. He proved, however, to be a native Arab, educated in Paris as a surgeon, and to be on his way to join the forces quartered in Arabia. His atten- tions to our sick friend were kind in the extreme. As we were now necessarily delayed for some days, I was very glad indeed of this opportunity of con- versing with one of the Pasha's Europeanised Maho- metans. It appeared that he had been more than eight years a medical student in Paris, and spc^e French with all the fluency, mannerism, and ease of the modem school, and must surely have been judged by his own friends to have undergone a strange me- tamorphose. Such a character as he was, is necessarily rare, and can be compared to little else than the strange pictures, so common in the works of Belgian paint- ers, of scenes from the metamorphoses of Ovid — as, for instance, the transformation of Actseon into a stag, or of the rustics who insulted Latona into frogs — half complete, and, as it were, in transitu; the Arab not wholly gone — the Frenchman not en- tirely come ; but both spoilt. He had gained a complete contempt for his own countrymen, chiefly on the score of their ignorance ; and as he walked round the little town of Suez, which is certainly poor, he would say, ** Bien misSr- able r and on pointing out to me any object pecu- liarly wretched, would add, by way of commentary, CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 203 ^^ nuns que voulez-vous de ces bSies-ld!" Any little specimen of ingenuity, — as, for example, a new kind of bouse door-lock that had just been invented, — he pointed out and commended; and this slight in- stance of sagacity seemed a strong redeeming point for his countrymen. It must have been a strange position to have found himself acting as the cicerone to a European, of the defects ofliis own country- men, over whom he had been so unnaturally raised, -—so raised as to be driven to despise them. Now I am sure no European of good feeling would ever speak in wanton contempt of the poor Egyptians. They have not offended him ; and why should he abuse them because he is better than they are? However, the Europeanised Arab has no such alter- native : they are his own flesh and blood, and he must abuse them, lest he be supposed to share their character ! But the great and crying evil of the system of educating eastern people for purely political pur- poses is on the score of religion. They are sent to Europe strict Mahometans ; they have no one, when there, to give them even a word of advice ; and they gradually fall victims to the heartless school of French infidelity : they degenerate from the straight- forward and truth-speaking Mahometan, to the free- thinking savantf indulging himself in every vice of the most dissolute metropolis of the world. The few who have been sent to England have in general turned out much better : here and there one has become Christian, and has maintained his faith on his return home, — they are sober and industrious; while the French school of Egyptians are, on the whole, both profligate and infidel, and in every way contemptible. Our friend the physician told us that he himself had remained a Mahometan, and was almost the only one of the company sent 204 A VISIT TO THE EAST. with him to France who had done so ; and it was curious to observe the strong remains of an anciait belief struggling with the laxities superinduced by indulgence in so much bad company and in so many practices inconsistent with the Mahometan faith. Still there was something very superior about him ; and his kindness to W could but have been the fruit of religious motives. In the course of conversa- tion, it transpired, that since the mission of the young students to Europe was in almost all cases an arbi- trary measure of the government, against the con* sent of both the parents and the oolema, the most anxious endeavours on the part of the family were made to reclaim them to the Musulman faith when they returned home. They were taken to one of the oolema most in repute for piety, in the hope that their discourse upon the future tortures to be visited upon renegades from the faith might make the desired impression ; but that this very seldom succeeded in the case of those who had been sent to France, for the liberty and laxity of their lives there had gene* rally extinguished their conscience by the time they came back. As for the children who came from the missionary school, it was in most cases sufficient for them. " These warnings," he added, '* had been the means of rescuing him firom entire disbelief." An accidental question was remarkable enough. " How many men," he asked, " of liberal and unprejudiced education do you think there are in Cairo?" and then, answering his own question, he replied, ** not more than five." Now, how far a person whose unhappy acquaint- ance with the lawless infidel life of young medical students in Paris, rendered him the fittest judge of true prejudice and true enlightenment, I shall not say. I apprehend that, practically, the terms are relative, or, as the Germans are so fond of saying, CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 205 subjective; that is, each person judges in the matter for himself, by his own standard, or by the cur- rent standard of his acquaintance or neighbourhood. Perhaps the Arab doctor's estimate of the old way of his forefathers, as prejudiced, chimes in with the tone of thought in our own country upon the same question. It may be asked. What prejudice is? and why it is a name so objectionable to educated and en- lightened thinkers ? If it be prejudice to adhere to such faith as a man has, until he gain a better ; to measure every thing by its rule; to hate and abhor every attempt to innovate and change it; to conform his own life to it; to abstain, indeed, from judging wherever it is possible, but where it is not, to measure every act in another by the clear rule of his own faith; — if this be " prejudice," I do not quarrel with the name : I say, give me prejudice. If eidightenment consist in holding a belief, but in suffering its rule to be inert on all occasions ; in never allowing it to cross the way of another, to oppose a change, to cancel a wrong principle, to sway an action, or to condemn a wrong deed,— if the former be prejudice, and this enlightenment, no well-princi- pled person can be at a loss to choose, or can won- der fbat they should be terms of mutual offence to their respective professors, and that between those who maintain them there should be but little amity. Perhaps, then, generally with regard to the charge of prejudice, it may be no useless precaution, first to observe, who it is that makes it, before it be suf- fered to have much effect ; for no term in general use appears less to aim at any known standard of its meaning. If the Jews had bowed to the opi- nions of the Egyptians, while they were a simple family of shepherds in the heart of a wealthy and civilised nation, they had never received the law T 206 A VISIT TO THE EAST. from Mount Sinai. When they did tamper with the luxuries of the people among whom they lived, their peculiar strength was gone. Antiochus Epiphanes appears to have thought them a perverse, bigoted people (teterrimam gentem) ; and had not the Par- thian war prevented him, would have attempted, a& he imagined, to humanise them by giving them Greek customs. Even so late as the reign of Trajan, a Roman poet speaks of them, — '' Quidam sortiti metuentem sabbata patrem Nil preeter nubes et coeli numen adorant ; Romanas autem soliti contenmere leges, Judaicum ediscuntt et servant, et metuuntjus.** — Juv. They were greatly despised, as a prejudiced peo- ple, by all die educated and well informed of their own day. This character, again, appears to have been equally shared by the first Christians ; and, as Bishop Warburton has shewn, the imputation of pre- judice and bigotry did very materially enter into the early pagan persecutions, for it is quite certain that for a long time the Christian Church was mistaken by the pagans for a sect of Judaism. It has been one of the results of the general spread of the Chris- tian faith, that these conflicting principles, in point of fact, come into much less open and avowed collision than they did at first ; not that there is any softening; of their real nature — they are as mutually opposed as ever — but in practice they are so blended and am- algamated, as but seldom to strike upon any test. One reason, therefore, why it is so little common to hear a Churchman stigmatised as bigoted and preju- diced, may be, that very few are entitled to it — I mean, like our Arab friend the doctor, we are in part enlightened, in part Christian. But if Christian maxims and conduct were in more stanch conformity with the Jewish rule, as stated by the Roman poet, the Jewish and early Christian reputation for bigotry CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. » ^07 and prejudice would not very long be withheld. Pos- sibly this will generally hold true with respect to any definite religious creed, that whosoever shall avow his belief, and yet desire to relax some point of per- sonal duty which his creed enjoins, will seek to find an excuse for his laxity in the current disapprobation that is ever ready to wait upon a suspicion of pre- judice. The stigma of prejudice attaches to up- right practice, in virtue of the many who are indis- posed to the strict rule imposed by a definite creed. In their vocabulary a strict unbending rule is syno- nymous with bigotry, superstition, prejudice, and the like ; but these are terms descriptive of their per- sonal dislike to such a rule, and nothing more. The question actually at issue involves a choice of real principles, and a selection of one or other alterna- tive ; for if the faith be truef sooner would the full tropical sun shine without heat, than it can exist without its rules of practice, or move without offend- ing those that are disinclined to it. Every imputa- tion of prejudice, therefore, is certainly not to be feared, for there may be many more cases where it is an honour rather than a disgrace. — Enough, how- ever, of such a digression. The following day W was still unable to proceed ; and I volunteered to convey a message to the servant, who had gone round the head of the gulf with the camels and baggage, to the station known as " the Wells of Moses." The caravan- route is a round of several hours' march, while by water, and with a fine breeze, an hour's sail brings a boat within a mile of the station. I had now a narrow escape of ending my career in the Red Sea. The boat I had hired had a huge lateen sail, without ballast ; and the wind coming briskly from the south- west, we had to make, as sailors say, a long and a short leg. Hardly had we got well up to windward 208 A VISIT TO THE JBAST. under the Ras Attaka, and expected with the next tack to fetch the station, than a squall, which had been gathering over the western^ side, burst down upon us. Had we not been providentially dose upon the wind at the time, we must have gone over ; as it was, the sail admitting of no reef^ we were obliged to take it down, and for some minutes lay broached broadside to the sea, each moment ex- pecting to be turned over. Having no knowledge of nautical Arabic, I could not give even a sugges- tion to the men, who seemed quite benumbed, con- sidering it to be their fate, until at last, by dint of signs and pointing, the comer of the sail was set in the bows of the boat, and by this means our un- gainly craft was brought before the wind, and then hoisting the sail, a few minutes sufficed to bring us back to the harbour of Suez. Our kind friend the doctor wrote us a letter in Arabic, which was sent by an express that returned early die following morning. The next day it blew another khamseen or siroc wind in the direction of Cairo, and the whole sky was literally the colour of brick-dust, the air hot, dry, and suffocating, even by the sea-side. W was now sufficiently recovered to walk about ; and we dissuaded him, with some difficulty, from ven> turing with us upon the desert. It was a sorrowful parting, for we had been companions the whole of the winter on the Nile ; but the step was unavoid- able, and he would not suffer either of us to return with him. On the 7th of March we went on board another boat, together with the old sheick Suleiman and several of his men, who, during our delay, had come back on foot to Suez ; and, after another very rough and awkward passage, we landed at the beach op- posite the Ain Mousa. It was amusing to see the Bedouins, who were perhaps for the first time in CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 209 their lives in a boat, quite sea-sick : even the old sheick, on seeing a crested wave break over into the boat, would look very grave and say, " Howadji el djemel taieeb" — the camel is better! We had this evening in our tent a discussion upon the probable spot of die miraculous passage of the Israelites. I fear it elicited far more ignorance than satisfactory solution, as such discussions upon the nature of the Scripture miracles usually do ^ but the subject is an interesting one, and has of late given rise to many infidel attempts to explain it away. I confess I suspect latent rationalism in every h3rpo- thesis that brings it near Suez. Indeed, the whole notion of rendering miracles easier of belief to scep- tical minds, by attempting to cover them with a man- tle of nature, savours most strongly of unbelief. If we are to believe the Scripture to be the word of Grod, there is no room for nicely poised hypotheses to account for its miracles ; for however the majesty of God may sometimes retire from human view, under the veil of those powers of nature to which we are accustomed, there are miracles where a sceptical mind has no refage but unbelief, and must either accept them as true, or disbelieve. It seems there- fore unworthy of a sound belief in the whole of Scripture, to attempt to smooth down and soften even those parts which admit it. For instance, a late author^ substantiates his theory of a passage near Suez, by remarking that an easterly wind would there, on meeting the tide, have had the natural ef- fect of raising the water to a wall on either hand, which lower down it would not have had. The real value of such reasoning may be tested by re- ferring to the parallel miracle of the passage of the Jordan; no sooner were the priests the Le- ^ Dr. Robinson's Biblical Researches. T 2 SIO A VISIT TO THE EAST. vites entered into the swollen stream, with the ark of the covenant, than the waters were divided, and they passed through on dry ground. In after times, the same happened thrice on the waters being touched by the mantle of Elijah. In either of these cases the agency of the ark or the mantle of Elijah has as little to do with the miracle as the east wind ; they were veils imder which God was pleased to conceal that power, which man is too infirm to be able to see more nearly. And, after all, what do we gain by the professor's hypothesis? Only a dilemma, that a north-east wind was then possessed of a natural power and property to raise the waters at Suez to a wall upon the left hand and upon the right, which no other north-east wind has since been observed to exert. However valuable therefore the professor's theory may be, it has surely omitted one essential point, — to provide for the sub- sequent extinction of this natural power of the north- east wind in that spot ! Such Scripture elucidations are not, then, without their difficulties. By the. way, I would remark, that before a tra- veller undertakes this journey, he would do well to examine himself upon the soundness of his be- lief. It made Volney, the shrewdest traveller France has ever had, an infidel ; Prince Piickler Mus- kau, a well-known wit of Germany, returned an infidel ; and even the Jews themselves turned to idolatry immediately after they had seen the very miracles of which we only read. And generally a visit to all sacred places is a severe trial of faith, under which many fail. The human mind is na- turally but too well disposed to recoil from the visible evidences of Him to whom vengeance belongedi, and too ready to veil from itself the fearful unseen majesty in whose presence Moses quaked exceedingly. The sight, therefore, of Mount Sinai and other holy places CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 211 is, in die matter of faith, one of those trying tests which, to use a familiar expression, must be either a kill or a cure ; and we cannot diink too often upon that maxim of the Gospel, which says, ** Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." These b^n from the point where diey who have seen do but end, and in the attainment of which they risk the concerns of eternity. The late influx of scien- tific travellers to these hallowed portions of our earth may be a sign of the centuries upon which we are entering. They have been, as it were, sealed for many generations ; and it is now, for die first dme, that the finger of science seeks to lay its puny and unholy grasp upon them. Maps and surveys are made of them, miracles are confounded in hypo- theses, and levelled at will to suit their exigences. The learned world, dred with Greece, is extending the range of its andquarian dominion to holy ground ; and when Scripture has received all the confirma- don that science can bestow, — and for the fnost part it is but a quesdonable confirmation, when we look at the insidious defences put forth in favour of the Scripture by many recent authors, — we shall at the last have to search in vain for any sense of that most high, mysterious, and awful majesty of the Almighty, that suflereth not the prying, sceptical, curious gaze of his creature. In the early pilgrim- ages to the Holy Land there was much of the deepest and truest religion — a yearning afler the. land that is very &r off — a stem sense of duty mingled with much romance and love of wild adventure — and to this day there remain some traces of the old enthu- siasm, buried beneath the poverty and wayworn con- dition of the Easter pilgrims. It was religion, and religion only, that brought our forefathers as pil- grims, and there was religion in the crusaders, wild warriors as they were. But with us it is now idle curi- 212 A VISIT TO THE EAST. osity ; and under the tenn idle I include all wild and curious speculation about geographical identities and scientific observations — mere idle curiosity ; and I say so the more fearlessly because it was idle curiosity that brought myself; and no frame of mind in this world can be so little suited to approach the holy ground whereon we were suffered to pass unharmed. This is very different from the Jewish feeling of reverence ; for to this day no Israelite will venture to approach the mountain which his people were once forbidden to touch. Travellers and pilgrims have before now forfeited die faith they expected to find; for faith, though nourished by sight, has a more heavenly root. The Jews could witness with their eyes the mighty works which Christ did, and though they saw diem, they could not believe. The Frank traveller may tread the ground — may even feel much emodon mixed widi curiosity and wonder ; but this is not to know the Almighty God, the mark of whose outstretched arm has been written upon the face of the land. The Jews wondered and said, We have seen strange things to-day; but, because they received not Moses and the prophets as moral teachers, no visible wonder, as though a man rose from the dead, seen with the eyes, either could or did make them believe. Belief, then, or faith, has some other condition of existence. Things visible, though legitimate helps to it if used aright, yet cannot give it. Either it endureth as seeing the invisible, or it has no existence — 'tis a name, and not a reality. Which of the two it may be, life and obedience alone can shew ; imperfecdy in this life, perfect only in the life to come. This I do know, diat as every thing in religion is either a savour of life unto life, or of death unto death, no- thing is more trtdy so than a &miliarity with the sacred scenes of our Christian faith — Mount Sinai CH. XIII.] THE CARAVAN ROUTE TO SUEZ. 218 and the Holy Land. For, however we may be mas- ters of our movements among the outward scenes, there is an internal world connected with them, of which we are not the keepers. 1 CHAPTER XIV. FROM SUEZ TO MOUNT SINAI — ARRIVAL AT THE CONVENT. Our route lay to-day entirely along the plain, with the sea continually in view ; and as we rode along, we could not forbear admiring the singularly limpid and cheerful appearance of the sea, contrasted widi the thirsty -looking dust of the desert. On the opposite side was seen the fine bold promontory of Ras Attaka, and receding from the view on either side a long line of hills, not in themselves remark- able for beauty, and yet not without a pleasing aspect from the purity of the atmosphere, particularly at sunset. At times the waters were a fidl rich blue, at times a delicate transparent green; but there was nothing in their colour calculated even remotely to justify the name of Red. Now the Black Sea has really a decided blackness above all other seas ; but this, if at all remarkable for an unusual colour, and entitled to any name in consequence, should be called Green. Probably its name Red, which was received among the Gentiles, has some connexion with the land we purposed to visit, and derived from Edom, which means " red.** Besides, the whole range of the rocks on either side, for some distance south, has a sufficiently strong blood-red character, to re- lieve past generations from the imputation of be- stowing an apparently significant title from caprice. We were from time to time surprised at the very sweet scent that seemed to fill the air whenever we came near some low yellowish-looking shrubs, and CH. XIV.] FROM SUEZ TO MOUNT SINAI. 215 for a while were not aware that it was caused by the camels feeding upon them. The odour was exceed- ingly sweet thus diluted in the air ; but the plant itself has a strong acrid smell, if gathered and taken in the hand. Towards evening there passed us on his way home a single pilgrim, with his *' scrip, staff, and scol- lop-shell" — a fine dark solitary figure, pursuing his way alone ; he went by without speaking, and in a little time we passed a party of European friends returning from the convent. We learned from them that our friends were two days in advance. To- wards sunset we came to our encampment, in sight and within hearing of the gentle swell of the sea, in a wadi, to which Sheick Suleiman gave the name Kebeer, where the air soon became loaded with the per^me we had been so pleased with in the day- time. There is something truly delightful in an evening upon the desert; the idea of rest belongs to us, though we seldom really enjoy it. The curse upon sin sent man to labour ; and perhaps nothing is so true, as a matter of daily observation, than that the en- joyment of rest is now practically lost. This the conduct of any crowd of men at once proves ; yet the instinct of rest I am convinced remains, and even in this life evinces itself on many occasions ; and an evening on the desert is really such a one. The glare and scorching of the sun is gone, the very eyes find relief; the cool of the evening sets in, the ca- mels are all brought round the tent, the fires are lighted, and the buzz of voices becomes subdued, conversation dwindles into murmurs, and then silence, among the little groups who have finished their sim- ple suppers. Reposing, with the tent-door open, from the really hard work of the day, and with the eye resting upon the wild convulsed and still inde- finite forms of the hills, it is impossible to forget 216 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the feelings which the end of the day brings, befoi^e night is about to close around a scene at once so so- lemn and wrapped up in so sublime and mysterious a manner with the events of the past. It is the pe- culiarity of our own British race to treat such noticms rather contemptuously ; be it so ! but this does not remove an indelible instinct. The command to rest was laid upon the Jews ; rest was with them, upon many solemnities, a religious duty. It is so still with us in some measure; the occasions, it is true, are less numerous, the obligation the same. The pagans made this a matter of ridicule, speaking of a Jew as a man whose every seventh day was a loss : cui septima queeque fiiit lax Ignava, et vitse partem non tetigit ullam.^ Now has our modem man of business a much better appreciation of religious rest than the pagan ? The following day the track turned off about noon to the left hand, and by evening we were in the midst of the rocks and wadis of the peninsula ; indeed, the peculiar scenery of the peninsula may be said to have begun from this day — an ex- ceedingly wild confusion of rock and vsdley, faintly tinted with a pale tinge of verdure. A litde after one o'clock we entered Wadi Howara, and came to the Ain Howara, unanimously marked by all tra- vellers as the Marah of Scripture ; — but of this and other details hereafter. The water is not so salt as that of the wells of Moses, but it has a bitter un- pleasant taste ; the spring is upon a little green knoll, and round it are a few decrepit starved palm-trees. The beast I was riding had apparently no distaste for the water, for it drank plentifully, widi the per- mission of the sheick whose property it was ; the ' Juvenal, Sat xiv. CH. XIV.] FROM SUEZ TO MOUNT 81NA1. 217 rest of the camels, however, passed without stopping. In about two hours further we came to an encamp- ment in Wadi Gharendel, a green flourishing spot, where we had plenty of wood for our fire, and were within a short distance of some tolerable water. Here we were in full view of the peculiar scenery of the wilderness, its very peculiarity containing a charm that no other country possesses. An Arabian wadi, or valley, is somewhat of which Europe has no similitude ; generally a dry water-course, mark- ed by numberless paths, along which the now and then fiirious mountain torrents force their zigzag way to the sea, making temporary islands of all the little mounds, whereon perhaps a few pale shrubs, per- haps a few bushes, or even now and then a dwarf acacia-tree, may be seen to grow. The result of this uncertain and violent irrigation is a pale sickly vegetation, that nevertheless satisfies the wants of the flocks of sheep and goats, camels and asses, wherein nearly the whole Bedouin wealth consists. So dangerous is this dry porous sand to the exist- ence of these shortlived rivers, that it is quite a rare thing for any of them to reach the sea in safety. Indeed, it must be a very great torrent that will travel for five miles. The rocks that shut them in are of every variety, and there is a peculiar and truly national look about them, so to speak, in the almost total absence of wood ; a solitary tree is all that is seen, except here and there a few groves of palm-trees. Each ridge that we ascended shewed some further summits in the wild confusion of moun- tain upon mountain, in the midst of which lay our path. We encamped in Wadi Khamoun, the same valley wherein the latter part of our day's march had been, literally engulfed in a den of wild red rocks, in the clefts of which was found, to our great delight, some very tolerable water. It is true they u 218 A VISIT TO THE EAST. made it muddy enough in filling the skins; but it was a great luxury after the brackish, leathery water upon which we had subsisted since leaving Suez. The next (4th) day's march brought us to the termination of Wadi Khamoun ; and towards evening we entered upon another, Wadi el Khameli. Our old sheick now rode up to us, seemingly in high spirits, and called to us to trot on : '* Yellah, yel- lah ; beth ya howadji, b^th.'* " Quick, quick ; the tents, the tents.'* The old man was coming to his tribe that was encamped there, and was in- viting us to take shelter in his tent from the rain, now beginning to come down. We had no more than a distant idea of his meaning ; but seeing him very earnest that we should ride on, we did so. By and by two men of his tribe, driving a couple of donkeys and a camel, met us, and were evidently well pleased to see him, for they came up to salute and kiss his hand. Some few questions now passed that we could not understand, after which we rode on, meeting here and there a straggler of the encampment tending his flock on the hill side. At last, on turning round a high hill, we entered a magnificent valley, at the lower end of which was a row of the low, dark, gipsy-looking dwellings of his people. No sooner was it known that some Frank strangers were come to visit them, than a visible sensation spread through the whole village, extending even to the children, who seemed to have gained an accession of ideas from the manner in which they left their play to Tun into the tents. We were speedily welcomed by several sturdy veterans, emerging from their piebald habitations. We were then conducted in due honour to the sheick 's tent, and, among the many pleasing kindnesses of an Arab reception, it was quite delight- ful to observe the real pleasure that every one pre- sent felt in being able to render any litde service CH. XIV.] FROM SUEZ TO MOUNT SINAI. 219 to the stranger : one would hold the camels, another would go for the carpets and mattrasses to bring them out of the rain, another would spread them ; and all with so much native politeness, that if artificial refinement be on the whole less awkward, it must be remembered it is far less sincere. No sooner were we seated, than the entire luxuries of the sheick^s people were set before us, — dried dates from the Wadi Feiran, sweeter far than Asia Mi- nor figs ; butter in little dirty pats full of goat's hair, somewhat white and insipid ; and a kind of cake made from coarse Hour. A brilliant fire was made in front of the tent, and presently some raw coffee was produced, which one roasted, while an- other was ready with a mortar to pound, another to boil it. It seemed impossible to be too civil to the strangers. It was an occasion for. the old men to put on their shawl turbans and faded red gowns ; and as they came one by one, with their pipes in their hands, we had the honour of a dignified salute, and a welcome, no doubt, had we understood it. Presently Suleiman himself came and intimated how glad he was to see us ; and then the dialogue became very animated^ the preparation of the coffee under- going, all the while, no interruption. Long prac- tice has evidently taught these men to make coffee^ and talk too. All present had innumerable questions to ask the old man, of his adventures in the great city, which very likely only a few of them had seen. As an instance how very much Adam's nature is the same in all lands, the sheick's two little grandsons, children of about three and four years old, crept out of the next tent and began to climb on their grand- father's shoulders as he sat cross legged on the ground, crawling over him, kissing him, and playing with his beard ; while he was evidently as fond and proud of them as any grandfather of Europe could 220 A VISIT TO THE EAST. have been. After sitting more than an hour out of compliment to the hospitable intentions of our enter- tainers, during which time we had more than once received the proffered pipes of the old men of the assembly, we begged permission to retire to our own tents, and left them to hear the end of their chief's narrative. No doubt they were supremely happy ; I confess I never saw so amiable and happy a party. So unusual an event as a visit of the Frank Howadji was not to be passed over without the slaying of a sheep, which was accordingly done ; and we were asked whether they should cook it, or whether it should be given to our servant. We were curious to see a specimen of Bedouin cuisine, and, with some sort of indistinct idea of Bedouin roast made savoury with herbs, it was decided that the sheick's son should be the cook : in due time, therefore, as we sat at our table entertaining great expectations, the son came into the tent, bearing a huge cylindrical iron pan, followed by his father in his best robes, their faces radiant with hospitality. The pan was brought near, and the son with his right hand diving a long pomted stick into its abyss, all that was thereby impaled, he released, by pushing it off upon the dish with his left hand, the old man all the while ejaculatingt " Taieeb, taieeb ! " At last the dish would hold no more, and after they had made its contents into a tasty pyramid, they went off to our companions with an offer of the rest. Unhappily for our entertainment, it turned out that they had not only used too much salt, but they had put in so much sand widi it, as to spoil it outright. In the morning we took leave, with the present of a pair of very handsome slippers for the young sheick's wife, and a couple of gold pieces for the grandsons, which I am not sure that we had not better have omitted ; for hospitality is a duty with the CH. Xnr.] FROM SUEZ TO MOUNT SINAI. 221 Bedouin, the observance of which is really sacred ; and knowing hardly one word of their language, it is impossible to say how far such a present might be i^eeable to their rude sense of propriety. I fear, however, that intercourse with Cairo has already so. far dimmed the light of their rude and hardy vir- tues, that, if such a gift were once unsuitable, it would now be welcome. The rocks of this wadi had a peculiar deep red glazed colour, of which no description can convey an adequate idea. It was altogether a romantic val- ley, with its Arab tents, its goats, sheep, and camels, and its untamed race of possessors. We encamped in the evening, after an interesting day's march through wadis of much the same gene- ral features, on a sloping descent, in sight of Djebel Serbal, from which the road leads into a hollow tract of land, whence there is a short detour into Wadi Feiran. As the day's march drew to an end, rocks certainly seemed to grow upon us, and we spent the night in view of the peaks of Mount Sinai, in the midst of a fine wilderness of crags and precipices.. The rocks immediately above were totally covered by an immense flock of birds that appeared to resemble cranes; but in the morning they were all gone. The foUowing morning, after we had descended the narrow pass in which we had spent the night, the baggage camels turned off to the left to as- cend the Wadi Feiran, and to approach the con- vent by the Wadi Es-sheick, while we took the direct pilgrim route, that has been carried with some considerable human labour, up the sides of a very narrow and precipitous pass ; perhaps, with the ex- ception of the ascent to Djebel Mousa, the only part of the peninsula where any great amount of la- bour has been bestowed upon a road. I'he track u 2 222 A VISIT TO THE EAST. varies a good deal ; at one time taking the left, at another the right of the water-course, and evinces considerable skill in its construction. Escaping from this path, we came upon an extensive sloping plain, where the host of Israel were encamped in view of the holy mountain. I could only ride on in silence, surveying the rude and convulsed features of the whole range, their hot burning red colour, and digesting as well as might be those great events of which they are our dumb witnesses. The convent, as we approached it, embedded in its deep red ravine, had a singular ap- pearance. It is little else than a walled enclosure of small buildings ; but its inhabitants, the Greek fathers, are truly kind and hospitable men, and their welcome repays the traveller whom they receive, for the rough accommodation and fare, to which it is his duty to conform. Our letter of recommendation from tfieir brethren at Cairo had gone round with the baggage ; but after a little inquiry this was soon overruled, and the rope lowered, by means of which we were soon swung up into the precincts of the convent. We were then immediately taken to our rooms by one of the brothers. We here met our former friends, who were safely arrived ; and as there were twelve Europeans al- ready in possession of the usual strangers' rooms, our entertainers were compelled to find us the best remaining reception, in one of their numberless ranges of building, at some distance from the main party. This proved no little to our advantage ; for the Arab servants, to whom the convent butler foolishly doled out as much araki as they asked for, kept high carouse, to the great disturbance of their masters, near whom they held their orgies, and to the exceeding scandal of the monks, who, we learned, bitterly complained of us after we were gone, and, it must be confessed, with justice. Indeed, CH. XIV.] ARRIVAL AT THE CONVENT. 223 had it been possible, many of the masters would have instantly discharged their servants ; but in the middle of such a journey, the servant is the real master; the titular master is without remedy, and must submit as he best can. CHAPTER XV. THE CONVENT OF ST. CATBEBIME. All experienced persons bear testimony to a certain practicsd maxim of daily life, that without a recog- nised leader nothing ever goes right. In every so- ciety, whedier of men ox animals, with the exception of ants and rooks, smoothness and unity of action are only to be obtained through the medium of a monarch. There must be an acknowledged head, who possesses some definite element of power, such as belongs to none other in the society. From hence proceed unity, firmness, and consistency, in the proceedings of the whole, harmony and mutual happiness among the members. In the East gene- rally, the monarchic principle is confined to the personal fascinations of superior intellect. There firmness, dignity, and decision in personal bearing, create the monarch whom the multitude obeys. In Europe authority is, for the most part settled, and lays claim to a divine right. It is exercised in the name of God and as his gift, and either obeyed or else denied as such. The personal character is very much lost sight of, in the superior principle of divine right which is at stake. Trifles often elucidate great principles ; and I am now about to speak of a prin- ciple ** anti-monarchic " in its nature, which allows the governing power to evolve itself, in the best way it may, from the confused jumble and collision of the separate members of the society. This is the CH. XV.] THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE. ft25 $o-called democratic power, at the basis of which lies the infidel dogma, that the governing principle is vested in the members of the society ; and if lodged in any one voice, is so solely by their consent, which voice then consequently becomes the organ of the multitude, and not of God. The party of Europeans who now found thems^ves together, were " fifteen in number;" we had one common object, viz. to visit Petra; one common method, as cheaply and as expe- ditiously as possible; one common bond of union, the mutual protection of each other's company ; and yet never, perhaps, did there exist a party so little disposed to act in concert. The cause being, diat we had no one amongst us entitled to claim the lead of right, and none whose superior knowledge and experience could con- ciliate obedience. We were a little specimen of a democracy, without the light of an authority either divine or moral ; and there was therefore free scope for questions of personal prudence, precedency, and authority, and, through these, an open door for dis- putes, coolnesses, and animosities, ending in total irremediable disunion. Now, to step to a more ex- tensive instance of the same principles, — the States of America, by a singular use of language, termed for the present "United," — whence, it may be asked, issues the power that governs and keeps them toge- ther ? From the midst of themselves. — Is it divine ? No ; for the power of the president is a mere aggregate of fractional parts derived from each citizen. " The thing formed cannot say to him that formed it. Why hast thou made me thus ?" The power of the presi- dent is not a superior constitutional power, presiding over the weighty interests that lie beneath it, be- cause it is by nature a mere organ of other voices, not in itself an inherent controlling power. Is it moral ? Only so accidentally ; and so far as it is so, the weaker natures will yield to the stronger, and ZZa A VISIT TO THE EAST. there will be a practical exercise of independent monarchic power, by the mere moral force of clear decisive energy of mind. Now this may, very possibly, be practically suffi- cient, so long as there remain external motives for union to cooperate with the right-minded efforts ^of peaceable individuals. A strong man will go on for years, struggling with a disease, that sooner or later will eat its way to his life ; and as it has ever been the fate of all democracies to fall to pieces from dis- union, so we may safely augur a more or less speedy termination of the American Union. Aggregate power, whatever centre it may find, is not of itself moral, and unquestionably not divine ; but no other than a di- vine power is permanent, and no other than a moral power can command and control. On several occa- sions, our little party fixed upon an elective spokes- man, — a measure in which all rejoiced, for it suc«- ceeded in obtaining some decision ; but no one heartily accepted the decision ; we did but think a disagreeable determination, on the whole a less evil than a protracted dispute. Numbers do not change the nature of men ; we may therefore fairly ask, — in the event of a continued peace, and after an ad- vance to a settled state of wealth and abundance at home, should any vital question arise in the Ameri- can Union, intimately affecting its constitution, and touching upon some sensitive ^nerve, where is the tribunal whose decision will conciliate the cheerful acquiescence of all ? There are many questions which shrewd men foresee to impend over that com- munity, when peace and plenty shall prompt busy minds to set them in agitation. When they come, I do not presume to say diey will not be decided ; but most assuredly the decision will not be accepted with any reverence for the authority which shall decide them, but simply as, on the whole, a lesser evil than CH. XV.] THE CONVENT OP ST. CATHERINE. 227 the continuance of uncertainty. Loyalty is due to that power only which is the gift of God ; and there is a fictitious loyalty, which the weaker nature pays to the stronger, where the belief extends no further than an acknowledgment of superior human wis- dom. But when submission is claimed for and en- forced by the majority, no one, in his heart, pays to this the smallest offering of respect or devotion. It is the voice of man, and not of God. Some months afterwards, I may now add, I chanced to be one of another company, where it accidentally happened that only one member could speak fluently the languages of the countries we were passing through. Here was the monarchic prin- ciple, a governing element that none else possessed ; and so simple a circumstance proved in practice the cause of the greatest mutual harmony, peace, and unity. I think I never knew a party whom ac- cident had for a time thrown in each other's way, so truly sorry to lose a single member: but then we were no democracy, no republic. When the demo- cracy I am now about to describe came to separate, hardly any single person called upon his neighbour to wish him farewell, and a prosperous journey. So much for republican happiness upon a little scale. 1 apprehend that the happiness of American families arises from the monarchic principle of their homes : and afler all, human nature, where the Gospel is known, will make efforts to rise over systems of man's creation ; and doubtless there is loyalty there, even towards an elective sovereign, that has a root deeper and holier than a share in his election. Their now growing disunion, however, and increasing reli- gious dissensions, are but the unhappy fruits of this great upas tree. One grand point of debate now occupied our thoughts, — the proper manner of conducting the 2ft8 A VISIT TO THE EAST. negoUation with the sheick of the Alewin Arabs, who was to furnish us with camels on our journey through Petra to Hebron. The decision evolved at the last, caused the mission of a certain janissary with instructions to summon the chief from his mountain fastnesses, and to make a bargain with him for the whole party, the limit being fixed at 100/., or 10,000 piastres. The janissary was sent off; and the same evening. Too Aleb, who appears to be well known as a guide for Franks, returned from convoying a Mr. Morris, an American gentleman, to Akaba. He was the bearer of a letter to the American consul, informing him, that owing to the wars of the moun-* tain tribes, he had not been able to accomplish more than a stealdiy entrance into Petra, and that from thence he had been obliged to return to Akaba, the journey to Hebron being pronounced unsafe. This intelligence we afterwards found to admit of a very easy interpretation, viz. that the wary, avari- cious Hussein, having gained early intelligence of the large party that was coming, had purposely magnified die dangers of the route to Hebron, with a view to recommend his measure, of hiring a large force of armed guides, in addition to the baggage camels : not that the report of disturbance was with- out foundation, for such there had been, yet it must ever remain a great question with diose who pass over this route, whetlier, of the two, they are not in more real danger from their protectors than from any enemy. Qvu8 costodiat ipsos Custodes? Plotters who lay their schemes too deeply are sometimes apt to overshoot the mark, and too great cunning sometimes defeats itself; so Sheick Hussein, in this instance, had a very narrow escape of outwit- ting himself; for Too Aleb's intelligence caused such CH. XV.] THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE. 2^9 immediate dismay and consternation, that eight of the company decided upon changing their route, and upon hiring their present camels to go direct to Ghaza. The remainder were in some little perplexity, until at last a. bold Kentish man proposed that all who would still make the attempt should join him. Here was a grand schism in our republic ; eight for Ghaza, seven for Petra and Hebron. It now became necessary to recall the janissary, and a messenger was sent off to cancel his mission. The following day we cleared out of the convent, just objects of suspicion to the fa- thers for the disorderly conduct of our domestics; and, wcmder of wonders, on the next morning it ap- peared, that an evening spent in the tents had so far, at least, brought about an unanimity, that the Ghaza party determined to adventure to Akaba, and there to be guided by circumstances. A second messenger was ^erefore despatched to reinstate the janissary. Such was the republican unity of our first starting. But to return to objects of greater interest. The democratic hurry of our proceedings had allowed us no more than three days, which we sought to employ lo the best advantage, as follows : Early oa the Monday morning, a monk of the convent kindly offered his services to describe the localities, and to relate the various traditionary le- gends connected with them. Before I inform you of all that he told us, let me first say, that, without attributing any design to our kind conductor, it was impossible not to see that the monkish legends were, in numerous par- ticulars, highly incredible and even silly. However, J am not one, and I hope never may be, of a cer- tain school of illundnati, who take a wilfiil pleasure in doubting legendary evidence of every kind ; and to whom any discovery whatever, available against 230 A VISIT TO THE EAST. an old traditionary belief, is as a pearl of invaluable price. However harmless the belief may be, and it is often both pious and almost always the source of much happiness, yet nothing seems to satisfy mo- dern science short of its total extirpation. In the eyes of a modem inquirer, an old story has no sort of value, unless there be a hope of its overthrow; he hails a legend with the same feelings with which the great heroes of romance are said to have come in sight of enchanted castles, as something which they thought themselves bom to destroy. Hence it comes to pass, diat of late years each book of travels has recorded fresh and fresh triumphs over the settled and received mistakes of ages: entire cities have been transposed and made to change their sites ; new races of men have been invented to build the pyramids ; and no author is content to return with- out a long string of the scalps of slaughtered legends, and without claiming at the least an *^ ovation" fo^ some victorious theory ! Now, with the leave of all such persons, be it observed, I can very well imagine a monk saying to his companion, '' There come these Franks, all the way from ♦ ♦ ♦ (how far or whence they cannot always tell) ; they find out that such a stone is 6,050 feet above the sea, and is of granite ; that it is exactly 750 feet distant from another stone. They say too, that we are quite wrong in speaking of such events as having happened here; and that they have excellent reasons for knowing them to have happened somewhere else !" What surpassing wisdom I I do not, for my own part, know how a sensible man can well refuse to allow the monks their opinion. The monks are certainly as wise in their way, for at least their belief is a harmless one ; they did not invent their story, whoever did, and they are happy in it. I question whether their wiser critics are as happy in their doubts ! CH. XV.] THE CONTENT OF ST. CATHERINE. 231 We entered the valley in which the convent lies embedded; and the first object we are shewn is a mound, on which the legend relates that Aaron stood when the people came to him, under the belief that their great leader Moses had been taken away from them. ''As for this fellow Moses, we know not what is become of him." Near to this spot are the supposed tombs of those slain in the pestilence, whereby their rebellion was punished ; a circumstance, I confess, a little calculated to stagger even a credulous faith, as they have every appearance of having been an Arab burying ground. From this we were taken to view a stone containing a naturally formed mould or hol- low, wherein Aaron is related to have melted the golden ear-rings he received from the people, from which when molten, the figure of a calf's head is said to have emerged. We were now opposite the plain where the Israelites were encamped ; and were shewn the rock whereon Moses is said to have broken the tablets of stone given him in the Mount. We then advanced, and turning still to the left, entered an entirely different valley, . in which there seemed to be abundance of water, from the unusually luxuriant growth of both olive and palm trees. In a little time we came to a large mass of stone, about which a number of smaller fragments were lying, which we were told was the stone from whence Moses ob- tained the water* If this, therefore, be true, we were now in the Valley of Rephidim, where was gained the first victory over the Amalekites, the first battle fought by the people afrer they had left Eg3rpt. I am always sorry to find reason to doubt an old tradition, which, in this instance, is supported by the concurrent testimony of the Arabs, who greatly venerate the spot, and does not therefore rest entirely upon the sole credit of a monastic legends But, as you will see hereafter, there is but too much SSt A TWIT TO THE EAST. reason U) question it. It is quite true that the ori- fices pointed to, aa those from which the water flowed, are remarkable enough ; and whatever become of the tradition reapecliDg it, as the rock in the Valley of Rephidim, I question whether another stone bo re- markably consonant to the history assigned to it, could be found in the whole world. 1 certainly never saw one. We had already passed two spots known aa be- lon^ng U) the history of Moses, one of which was the supposed seat where he gave judgment to his people ; when, leaving the rest of die party to pro- ceed to the garden and convent of the Forty Mar- tyrs, a little further up the valley, I went wandering round the plain El R^ah, which we bad crossed the preceding day, for the sake of enjoying the subli- CH. XV.] THE CONTENT OF ST. CATHERINE. ^3S mity of the scene in quiet, and, if possible, to bring away a drawing of it. The accompanying view' shews the group of rocks, as seen from the plain, where there is good reason to believe that the hosts of Is- rael were once encamped. It occupied me the re- mainder of the day ; and when finished, I found my eyes so bewildered with the sun's glare, reflected from the blood red or glazed copper coloured rocks, as for some moments to experience a little difficulty in clearly seeing my way home. Unhappily, the even- ing gave us fresh cause to learn, how little a dis- jointed party can agree upon a plan, wherein all have a consent to express. The following morning Mr. Clark son prepared to ascend Mount Sinai, or the Djebel Mousa ; and, to economise time, I went with others up Djebel Catherine. It is scarcely necessary to say that the good fathers, who are accustomed to such visitors as ourselves, perfectly understand the necessary little ^arrangements of refreshment and guides. Mr. C. kindly allows me this extract from his diary* *' Tuesday, 17 th March, 1840. I ascended the Djebel Mousa, or Mount Sinai, in company with Mr. L., a Venetian gentleman. The heat of the weather, and the great ruggedness of the path, made it fatiguing; but the extreme grandeur of the scenery through which we climbed, and the prospect from the summit, made us ample amends. Rude steps, now greatly ruined, have been cut all the way to the top; but they are in such a condition as to be of little further use- than to point out the proper path. it required about forty minutes to reach a small plain, through which a brook of good water runs, and where we reposed awhile and sketched the scene. In ^ See frontiq[)iece. X 2 ftSA A VIBIT TO THE EAST. this plain stands what is called the Grotto of Elias, a rude building, near to which grows a lofiy and solitary cypress tree. Looking upwards from it we see, for the 6rst time, the peak of Mount Sinai, and the chapel which crowns it, the object of our pilgrimage* On this spot there appears to be an Arab tradition, purporting that Moses here received the law of the Ten Commandments. Ascending from hence, by steps, in about fifteen minutes we reached the summit, whereon stands the dilapidated church, and there enjoyed the noble and singular prospect diat extended itself around us, but which, consisting of rocks and mountains, make no figure in a descrip- tion, and require to be seen in order to form a just idea of them. After half an hour's contemplation we returned by the same route, and were more than ever struck by the wild gloomy magnificence of the Pass, till catching a view of the convent, and the more open country below, we again seated ourselves to enjoy the aspect of this singularly wild, barren, and yet most imposing, scenery. I did not ascend the twin peak, called Djebel Catherine ; it is higher and more fatiguing to reach, and the prospect is much the same." Now for the route to the top of St. Catherine :-* an active middle-aged monk, as guide, made the com- pany four in number. A little Arab boy of the Dje- balieh people, who are dependents of the convent, was sent on with some dry bread, a salt fish of some unknown kind, and a few dates. For the first half hour our path lay over the same ground which we had visited yesterday. After passing the rock of Moses, in about ten minutes further, we came to the ruined convent and garden of £1 Arbaheen, the Forty Martyrs, so named from an existing legend of an incursion of Saracens, who put to death forty of the monks. The garden seemed en. XT.] THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE. 285 ftiU of oHve and other fruit trees, but sadly needing the handiwork of the gardener. A little further on was another garden, near to which we turned off to the right hand to ascend an ugly steep precipitous gully, that appeared to channd away all the winter torrents that fall on this side of Mount St. Catherine, down to the cultivated precincts of the monks. The pathway was itself a token how little frequented the pilgrimage to St. Catherine has been of late years — winding dirough the huge broken stones that encumber the sides of the mountain, crossing and recrossing the dry bed of the torrent, and in some places hardly to be recognised from the tributary water-courses. It is not to be supposed, that persons, who had been for ten days air and sun dried upon the back of camels, could walk up this mountain side with all the alacrity of European mountaineers, and our good-humoured guide, observing our fatigue, frequently invited us to try the araki flask which he carried. Afler several halts of this description we came at last to a summit, from which I expected a very few minutes would complete the ascent. We had been deceived by the pyramidical form of the part we had yet to ascend, and almost an hour proved requisite to bring us to the little chapel of St. Catherine, where, according to the belief of the convent, repose the remains of the saint herself. The ascent had occupied four hours ; but words cannot convey the grandeur of desolation that lay before us, it was indeed — as Sir Frederick Henniker has ex<^ pressed himself—'* as if an ocean of lava, running mountains high, had suddenly been commanded to stand still." We were now compelled to take shelter in the ruined and deserted chapel, which is a little square building; being advised, after the heat we had gained from the exertion of climbing up, to avoid, dot a while, exposure to the remarkably cool fresh ^36 A VISIT TO Tfifi EAST. breeze ; almost the only sensation of cold we had known, except that of the night air in oar cells in the convent, since we had kuaded in l^gypt* As soject can convey ; it is a mental leprosy that breathes its own poison wher-. ever it looks I There is a little crooked palm-tree where we step down to go into the vault ; one must stoop in entering, and nothing but a dead dry atmosphere^ with heaps of bones lying in some disorder, meets the spectator when he is within : there are coffins by themselves containing the remains of the former au- thorities of the convent; but I was too happy to come away to make many inquiries. There now remained a visit to the difierent CH. XV.] THE CONVENT OF ST. CATHERINE. 211 household arrangements of the convent, which it would have given me great pleasure to have seen, had our time permitted ; I mean the workshops of the lay brothers, who are tailors, shoemakers, and hattiers; the oven, where they prepare and bake their bread, of which a great deal is given to the neighbouring Arabs their dependents, dieir araki distillery, and their storehouse of provision. The convent plays so important a part in the simple his- tory of the daily life of the Arabs of the peninsula, that it would have been peculiarly gratifying to have known how so kind and hospitable an estaUishment was maintained in the heart of the wilderness; but i% was necessary to prepare for departure with our own hands, our unhappy servant having never been sober since he came within its waUs. About four o'clock in the afternoon we left the convent, after taking fare- well of its hospitable prior, and raiJ^ing him the pre- sent which is justly expected from all Europeans, who are well able to contribute it, and which is so well bestowed ; for every poor person is welcome to remain as long as he likes, and the shelter of the convent, with a share in the diet of the brotherhood, is reftised to none who come properly recommended, I have frequently thou^t since, on hearing die ignorance of diese monks treated widi contempt; > their belief in their traditionary stories ridiculed, their superstitious observances laughed at, and gene- rally the object of their lives in the heart of the desert wondered at, with a smile of implied if not expressed commiseration; on observing, too, that the ordinary tone of travellers' reports since Burck-* hardt's time has been more or less characterised by a sort of pity for them, as self-condemned to ah unin* teresting, lazy, superfluous life; that, could we but know the opinion they must form of the Frank tra- vellers, to whom they extend their hospitality, how 242 A VISIT TO THE EAST. much we should gain by an interchange of sen^ timents. We wonder at the nature of their occupations : what must they think of ours? True! they can understand the motive of a long journey, the object of which is to offer up devotions in places that are deemed peculiarly sacred : but what roust they think of Europeans^ whom curiosity^ and not devotion, brings to th.ese very scenes, and from whose out- .ward conduct, if they judge at all, the only pos- sible conclusion they can come to, is,, that they have no religion? Indeed, it is to be feared, that they have already learned to think so ; for the guide, I remember, as we passed the church, urged as an objection to our going into it, that divine service was being performed : it was the poor man's evident opi- nion that this was something in which we could take no interest. We wonder at the credulity which has led them to surround their own neighbourhood with so very many improbable historic localities: may they not equally wonder at the piety of our baro- metric and compass admeasurements, at our map- pings and surveys of holy ground, which they know only as places of prayer and pious meditation. We wonder at their ignorance : may they not with equal justice wonder at our knowledge ? We wonder at the number and regularity of their hours of prayer :• have they not quite as just reason to wonder at the absence of ours? We wonder at their punctilious observance of the rules of their order in the matter of diet and observance of Lent: will it not be equally strange to them that we almost disregard fast and festival, and yet profess to have an in- terest in religion ? On these and many other points it might possibly be to our advantage, to inter- change opinions with these monks ; a nation which knows so little self-denial as our own will -easily CH. XV.] THE CONVENT OP ST. CATHERINE. 243 incline towards any escape from that which reminds them of duties, long since abjured. If as a Christian people we have lost the noble self-denial that once existed among us, we shall find but a thin screen for our deficiencies, in the shrewd discernment whereby we discover, that though it exists elsewhere as a testi- mony against ourselves, it exists together with su- perstition and ignorance. Perhaps if we knew the real opinion of these monks, it would be that our accurate scientific know- ledge of these holy places was real ignorance, and their devotion, imperfect as it might be, was at least a step towards real knowledge. Professor Schubert, who remained som6 consi- derable time in the convent, has given an exceedingly pleasing description of the very regular, devout, and charitable lives of this brotherhood. Now, that per- fection is as little attainable in the seclusion of a monastery, as in the throng of the great world, I am quite willing to believe ; and doubtless the shrewd eye of a man of the world may detect many things in every convent not in strict keeping with the pro- fessed objects of its institution. But before such jan observer allows himself to make these the point of his jests, he would do well to inquire how far he sympathises in the professed object of a monastery, ' self denial! for satire of this sort must ever be open to the suspicion of being directed, not against failure, but against success in such discipline; and when all has been said, nothing can alter the relative position of those who strive afler the fulfilment of a known duty, and those who utterly and openly ne- glect it. CHAPTER XVf. OF THE ROUTE TO AKABA. AN ARAB FIGHT. A RAINY NIGHT. FARTING WITH OUR OLD FRIENDS; AND BARGAIN WITH AN ARAB CHIEFTAIN. When we were all once more encamped on the desert, in the Wadi £s-sheick, we presented a gay Turkish scene, forming in all seven parties, with about sixty camels, servants and camel-drivers in proportion. The evening looked grey and gloomy, but, unaccustomed to changeful weather, we went to bed in high spirits at being once more free from walls, and nothing doubting of the morrow. The encampment was in one of those noble valleys which I think must be peculiar to the mountains of the East ; and with our minds at ease upon the now decided course we had resolved to take, we retired to rest. In the middle of the night our servant awoke us out of sleep with the cry, "Master, master, the waters are coming ; get up, get up." We awoke, and heard the tent shivering from the violence of the wind, the rain beating against it, and knowing neither the cause nor the extent of our danger, dressed in the greatest haste and alarm : presently, as we were without light, and could but just distinguish from the tent-door the dim forms of the hills marked by an indistinct line of white, that proved to be the foaming course of a torrent, the waters did come down as they had pre- dicted; fortunately the tents had all been pitched, not in the water-courses, but on the high ground or CH. XVI.] THE ROUTE TO AKABA. 245 banks ; and within a couple of yards from our tent, we found in the morning a respectable stream rushing rapidly past. The valley was here so broad and flat, that the waters were compelled to spread them- selves, thus insulating the different tents between numerous streams, pretty much after the manner of that river, which Cyrus in displeasure caused to be divided into 360 channels. The noise and confusion of the night was no little amusing; but when we began to find that the rain did not come into the tent, and that except the water rose considerably during the remainder of the night, we should be safe from being overflowed, we lay down again to wait for morning. The morning shewed a really extra- ordinary sight : the poor camels, who seem very miserable during rain, were straggling to and fro ; their owners looked wet and comfortless ; the sheicks, as our friend Suleiman did, came to beg shelter in their master's tents. Here and there a tent was blown over, and the men were at work securing the pins. It was the part of wisdom to remain quiet while the rain lasted, which it did till nearly twelve o'clock, when the clouds suddenly cleared off, and left us in the enjoyment of a beautiful sky, a warm sun, and a fresh breeze. We were to re- main a few hours for the tents to dry, and were then to make the best use of the remainder of the day in continuing our march. During the preparation for our departure we had an opportunity of witnessing a curious scene, the explanation of which I could not thoroughly un- derstand at die time. M. Laborde has remarked, that in whatever amount of clamour these men may indulge, they observe extreme caution to abstain from striking; what we saw proved the truth of this. Perhaps about thirty attendants were as many as we required, and certainly not fewer than 150 Y 2 246 A VISIT TO THE EAST. of the Bedouins were pres^it ; by and by some cause of dispute arose, and high and loud was the quarrel, but what it was about we could not learn ; still, in an incredibly short time, the wlude assembly with their hands on their swords left their different occupations about the tents, and the noise, as may be supposed, increased tenfold ; in fact, a claniour, such as I imagine can be heard nowhere in per- fection except fipm Arabs. We all collected round * them, expecting some wonderftd tumult would be the end of it, but in a whQe one dropped off, and then another, and the whole ended very like the rivulet that was running close by — in nothing. The servants had said from the beginning, in answer to our inquiries what the matter was, '* only Arab men make plenty noise.*' It is possible diat the ex* ecution of two of them, for a robbery committed by the Towara tribe, upon a caravan of merchants, and a fine exacted by the Pasha of Egypt from the rest, may have contributed its share, to taking the edge firom off these disputes. It appears, as I have since been told, that the quarrel originated in the claims which some other tribes are constantly making, to a share in the patronage, which the convent possesses, and bestows upon those that are its recognised pro- tectors. As the sun shone clear and brilliantly over the scene of our night's disaster, we walked out to look leisurely at the wild spot in which we had encamped; and strolling down the valley, were much surprised to observe that the stream, which not two hundred yards higher up was still tolerably violent, had totally disappeared. A large stone lay in its course, and round the stone a little hollow, which it had not vitality to pass. I had before no idea of the porousness of the sand, which appears to be so great, that the now exploded theory of the CH. XVI.] THE ROUTE TO AKABA. 247 absorption of the Niger might some time ago have gained from it a higher degree of probability. We commenced our march, which scarcely lasted four hours, and still found ourselves in the Wadi Sheick. We passed through some bold scenery, although it had become quite perceptible that the mountains were now gradually dwindling down into the plain. The morning of the third day we emerged into the plain, and crossed it apparently without a track. Our guides now commenced a loud brawl- ing dispute about the route to be taken, which ended in Suleiman starting forward, and calling to us to follow him, by which manoeuvre the course of the whole party was decided. We learned, afterwards, that the dispute turned upon the choice of routes, — the inland course upon which we were now moving, or the longer one by the sea coast, which M. La- borde and other travellers had taken. This dispute was continued as we kept advancing ; and we had to descend some very awkward precipitous steeps, evidently in search of a lost track, until at last we found a well beaten, tolerably frequented path, and soon entered a wadi, named Zaranaeg, bounded on the left by a tall range of pale-coloured sandstone rock, extremely similar to the western side of the Dead Sea. Advancing along this, in a little while another wadi fell into it, and the union of these two assumed the name of Wadi el-Ain, or Valley of the Well, deriving its name from a copious spring of very bad water which it possessed. It was about three o'clock when we arrived there'; and, as if it had been impossible for us to do any thing in unison, it was for some time so imcertain whether this was to be our halting place, that tliree of the tents were ac- tually pitched, when the rest of the caravan deter- mined upon proceeding. It was, however, a de- lightful spot : we had ample time to rest and enjoy aquietevening, with a small and, for once, unaDimoua party. I'he annexed drawing may serve to give an idea of our houeehold establishment, and the comfort that may be enjoyed on the desert. Indeed, the time thus spent may be well looked upon as a little episode in life, the peculiar delights of which can never, and perhaps also ought never, to return. From Wadi el-Ain our way led over the de- file which is «een in the drawing, ihrougli a broken rough road, covered with loose stones. When we had scrambled through, there succeeded another rough winding path, descending gradually towards a lai^e open valley, at the end of which our friends had encamped, as we were infallibly informed by the remains of fire-places, and sundry other vestiges which a European encampment leaves upon the &ce CH. XVI.] THE ROUTE TO AKABA. 249 of the wilderness. Passing this, we entered another rough rocky region, full of decayed acacia-trees, and then came through a narrow pass, Wadi Nutir, to which a somewhat sandy valley succeeded Wadi el-Sheick Atir ; then passing an isolated ugly moun- tain on the right, Djebel Hird, after a very long day's march, we came up with the rest of the party in Wadi Nymshash. The following day our route became much less varied, greatly resembling the uni- formity and tameness of the desert from Cairo to Suez. Stony gravelly undulating slopes, with scarce a tuft of herbage, wearisome and colourless, the eye literally wasting itself upon a level, and the heat of the sun, together with the thin, meagre maze of the atmosphere, almost refining the be- holder out of the sense of his own identity. In this way we came to our encampment, in a hollow de- pression, named, I think, Wadi Sothi. We had before during the day passed along another, scarcely discernible wadi, £1 Hessi. The next morning, in about an hour, we entered the usual Hadj track from Akaba to Suez, and shortly came in view of the great valley or plain of £1 Arabah, and die tower- ing eastern range of the rocks of £dom, in which lay the great object of our journey. If I had been a despot, I should have delayed the whole caravan for the sake of a sketch ; but this was impossible. The view is here as noble, as it comes suddenly and unexpectedly upon the sight. We were upon a table-land, greatly above the level of the sea, and quite unconscious of the precipice that now burst upon us. A few yards further shewed us a deep winding chasm, rugged and bristled with rocks, down which the path descended. The gulf of Akaba, with its misty and placid blue waters; the long, sandy plain of Arabah ; the distant hills and fastnesses of Edom now burst clear upon the view. After all 250 A VISIT TO THE EAST. there is a charm and beauty in the wilderness, which those lands where man dwells do not share. Moun- tain scenery is the admiration of every man, be he learned or rustic, a citizen or a savage, a man of peace or of war. We enjoy to see the clear tokens of a durability, which we know we have not in our- selves ; perhaps it was some such feeling as this that suggested to Lord Byron the notion he has expressed in his " Childe Harold," of mountains as friends. Without the smallest wish for their friendship, I think there can be nothing so solemn for the eye to look upon, as the '* vast and howling wilderness." Every part of it crowds the mind with thoughts of the slow, gradual, successive unfolding of that great scheme, wherein lies our own faith, and in which is treasured up our hope of a land that is very far o£ But, as I have said before, the eye has no nerves of its own in communion with the heart; and these things though seen, may after all be only seen. On descending the pass, and on coming into the plain, we were greeted by the pleasant sea breeze, and skirted along the very edge of the shore ; the camels now and then attempting to taste the water, and as speedily desisting. There was some little surmise and sensation respecting the probable fate of the janissary's negotiation; but on entering the palm- tree grove, wherein lies ensconced the little square fortress of Akaba, we soon learnt, that after all our long debated measures, our negotiation had not ad- vanced a step. The Sheick Hussein was in attend- ance; he had had previous intelligence of our arrival, and declined treating with any but the principals. The history of our bargain is a curious one, as shewing how much superior resolute Arab cunning may become to European stratagem. The only way to deal with a Bedouin, is a plain straightforward resolute determination, on the part of the European, r~ CH. XVI.] THE ROUTE TO AKABA. 251 to have his own way ; taking care that he ask for nothing unjust or unreasonable, for these men have a real sense of what is, and what is not just ; and as their own government is one in every way moral, plain resolute determination, enforced by calmness and dignity of manner, will carry every thing before it. But when was any thing republican, either re- solute, determined, or dignified? The sequel will shew how we fared. Sheick Hussein is a little man, middle aged, with a quiet lynx-eye that sees every thing at a single glance, a mere shrimp compared with our old friend Suleiman, but possessed of a hundred times his influence. He wore the usual Arab dress^ the long red outer gown, and a very handsome costly shawl turban. The accompanying sketch represents him as he sat counting over the gold 5 piaster- pieces, in which coin the first part of the price we had agreed upon was paid to him. To those who know what precaution it is necessary to take, not to be observed while making these sketches, it will be sufficient to say that it was considered a tolerable likeness ; but to his peculiarly sinister and avaricious Arab expression of face, no ordinary sketch could do justice. It had been our unhappy messenger's own cunning to represent the whole party as the suite of a great consul ; and though one may fairly appre- hend the Bedouin notion of a consul to be rather indefinite, yet doubtless a consul passes with them for some very great man or other. The first act, however, of Arab hospitality and respect, on the part of the sheick, to this supposed great man, at once exploded his device. He came in great sim- plicity with the offering of a sheep for the consul ; but we were a democracy, and no one was pre- pared to personate the consul ; so that after lead- ing about his sheep in a string for, some time, in-* A VISIT TO THE BAST. quiring which was the consul's tent, he was obliged, to return to the fort, with his intended gift trotting innocently by his side. Whether this device, when detected, appeared to him a very consular act, it is impossible to say. Ic gave him an excellent handle against us, and Sheick Hussein was too good a tac- tician not to make the most of it. He now went round to the sbeicks who had brought us here, and learning from them the num- ber of camels which we had employed, be informed them all, that he could on no account permit them to take us back. Having therefore safely seemed ua as prisoners, he patiently, and with perfbct in- CH. XVI.] PARTING WITH OUR OLD FRIENDS, 253 difference, waited an application on our part to know his terms. When the device of the janissary had become known, it was greatly reprobated by very many in our republic ; but what was to be done no one knew. After a singular simultaneous discussion, in detached groups, assembled in different tents, and after many intercommunications with each other, by means of wandering messengers, a sort of unanimous determination of applying by deputation, somehow evolved itself; and accordingly a deputation was sent, who obtained an audience in the presence of the Turk- ish aga, or petty officer of the fort. The vanity of our economical dreams was now made to appear; and when the deputation came back, informing us that they had advanced to their ultimatum of £120 — 12,000 piasters — without obtaining even an offer from the sheick, it became evident that we were now ** in a fix," as the American phrase ran on the occasion. As may well be supposed, the sensation caused by this was very great ; some declared they would remain all the year rather than submit. The next day passed, and nothing was done; until at last, by dint of several interviews and explanations, by producing the firmans of the pasha and the sultan, and by making the best shew we were able, the ex- orbitant terms were obtained of 14 Spanish dollars per camel, together with 13 dollars for an armed guard, for each traveller — thus furnishing us with 15 mighty men of war, the only really dangerous part of our journey, — 70 piasters each to the sheick of Wady Mousa, and a present to the Governor of Akaba, of 20 piasters each ; amounting in all to 1 190 piasters, or £12. Ss, Professor Schubert passed over the same route at the rate of 10 dollars per camel two years before. This being the end of all our deep-counselled schemes of economy. Hussein's conduct throughout the whole was a 254f A VISIT TO THE EAST. perfect piece of cool, shrewd, sharp-siglited, resolute cunning, and we were all the while at his mercy. During the intervals of this strange and enter- taining negotiation we employed ourselves in col- lecting some shells from the Red Sea, which may be here found of tolerable beauty and some little variety. Dr. and Mrs. C. were the most dili- gent in this pursuit. We had now to take leave of our former friends the Towara Arabs, and a highly amusing scene it proved. The European in the East must not fail to accustom himself to a totally different order of pro- priety upon the subject of presents ; for upon this point there is no delicacy, scruple, or reserve what- ever, among eastern people. If an Arab thinks he should like any thing that his employer has, he asks for it point blsuik. The sheicks of the different parties had for some time been urging upon their employers their respective merits, with the peculiar eloquence that is indigenous in an Arab when pleading for backshish; and indeed we had been so well pleased with the kindness and good- humour of Suleiman, that we had paid him perhaps rather more than the necessary amount of reward, amongst other things a pound of English powder. He had accordingly taken his leave for the time apparently well pleased, when he happened to see one of his neighbours arrayed in a tawdry, glaring red gown that he had just received as a present from his master. This superior smartness on the part of his friend quite overcame the old man ; and speedily learning whence he had obtained it, he went in search of the vendor of robes, and finding a simi- lar one still on sale for 25 piasters (5«.), he came to beg we would give it him. At first we refused ; but on seeing him put it on, and that he was (ai more delighted with it than a child with a plaything, we CH. XVI.] PARTING WITH OUR OLD FRIENDS. 265 could no longer object to contribute 10 piasters each towards the purchase; and he went away pleased beyond all description, and came to take his final leave of us in it. Though in this matter he behaved so much like a child, he was the finest-looking Bedouin I have ever seen, and appeared to be in universal esteem among his tribe. He described himself as brother to Too Aleb ; perhaps only a brother-chief- tain, and sheick of the Towara, one of the tribes who protect the convent, or what is more probable, chief of one or two encampments. His portrait (see page 188) is tolerably like him, and was taken on the rainy morning that he came to take shelter in the tent, when we had just quitted the convent. We were at tlie time exceedingly sorry to part with him and his people, for they had been kind, faithful, and civil, and not an angry word had passed between us. 1 do not pretend, in their favour, that they are patterns of the rude virtues of savage life, but we did not lose the smallest fraction of our property in their hands, and 1 am told that thievery is a perfect abomination to a Bedouin. It is wonderful that they should have maintained them- selves in so primitive a state, and so little corrupted with their intercourse with Cairo. It may be in the case of the Arabs of die peninsula, that their intercourse with settled nations has taken the extreme rough- ness from off the manners of the desert, and not left its poison behind; at least we had subsequently reason to think them many degrees more humanised than the Alewins amongst whom we afterwards fell. None are able to judge what the Bedouin really is, except they speak his language, and in some measure enter into the feelings and tone of thought he in- herits from a long line of ancestry. At present I can only say, that every savage nation and people are in many points a testimony against Christian vice and 256 A VISIT TO THE EAST. corruption, and the Bedouin in Very many points. Before we expose his failings, let us remember who they are for whom it will be less tolerable in the day of judgment than for Nineveh, Tyre, and Sidon. Travelling teaches a person to lose sympathy with Christian harsh judgments upon the failings of other people. When the time came to part with our convoy we were really very sorry to lose the old man ; and he seemed sorry too. He told us that the next time we came to his country we must come to live in his tent. One of the Frank gentlemen, to the Arab's great surprise, took his conductor by the hand, and with a hearty English shake, bid him good bye. CHAPTER XVII. FROM AKABA TO PETRA. The morning of the 27th was now come, and our long wished- for departure was to take place. Sheick Hussein himself did not accompany us, but gave us in charge to his brother, Sheick Salem, a man very inferior to himself. Sullen, morose, and heavy minded, he seemed in every way unfitted, either to acquire or maintain any sort of dominion over the wild people with whom he had to deal. It was still interesting to observe what a powerfully beneficial influence the name alone of sheick exercises among these men. How far the oflBce is hereditary we could not learn, but it would seem that though ancient descent claimed ap undisputed allegiance, yet that now and then ta- lent and personal cunning would work its way to the title and its power. The authority when obtained consists in nothing more than the unwritten code, which the sheick administers in his own person ; and though the hereditary office of sheick unquestionably partakes of the sacerdotal power, yet the many suc- cessful usurpations of its privileges must have gone far to divest the name and power of their true charm, even in the eyes of these untaught men, for no per- sonal sagacity can ever acquire the genuine influence of legitimate power. This personal rule is the only one which these men know, and it serves to keep them in tolerable obedience and subjection. Our sorrow at parting with our former attend- z 2 25S A VISIT TO THE EAST. ants was greatly increased upon seeing into what kind of hands we had really fallen ; our camels were now thin, meagre, diminutive animals ; the men with a strong swardiy Spanish cast of countenance, dark and little, wearing long matted hlack hair, uncombed and unshaven, their heads covered with the kefidli or coloured Bedouin handkerchief, generally confined by a band of brown worsted yam. It would be great injustice to them to say that they shewed no desire to merit applause ; unfortunately such was the extremity of their' zeal, that it placed every thing in imminent danger of being broken. The poverty of the tribe too was sadly manifest iB the matter of packing ropes, a great part of which they were compelled to con- descend to borrow from their better furnished neigh- bours, the Towara. The scene at starting was strange enough in its way: the riders were discontented with their dromedaries, and clamorous for others; the servants were crying out for better ropes, aid abusing the clumsiness of their assistants. All was in uproar — no one knew which camels they ought to take, when the wily little figure of Sheidc Hus- sein was seen quietly moving in the midst of the Babel, his sharp eye catching every thing at a glance, and setting very noisy disputants right with a word. I had no idea before, of the power centred in the chieflain ; his men literally quailed before him as he came near. At last the tents were struck, we mounted our dromedaries, and slowly emerged out of the palm- tree grove, wherein we had spent a very feverish three days; and with a brisk wind full of sand, meet- ing us from the north, we fell quietly into the track chosen by the rest. We expected that the guides would have taken the mountain path by which Mr. M. (whom we had found waiting at Akaba, upon the intelligence that a CH. XVII.] FROM AKABA TO FETRA. 259 large European party was expected) had a few days before made his short excursion and back to Petra ; but as democratic proceedings are generally un- conscious of a deliberate purpose, most probably the first camel decided the matter of itself, and the lower route, up the valley of El Arabah, was thus chosen. I regretted this extremely; but how was a single person to change the route of such a party as ours? Chance may frequently, and in- deed commonly does, decide corporate movements ; it requires concert and unanimity to alter them ; and this was in our case impossible. To regret, and to have patience, was the only alternative ; for, judg- ing fit)m the description of Mr. M., the mountain- path must have not only commanded some extensive views over the surrounding country, but the very range we should have passed over, now on our right hand, I take to have been the country of the ancient nation of Edom, who for many generations dwelt among its hills and valleys. It has been supposed that the valley of El Ara- bah was the ancient bed of the river Jordan ; but with scarcely any better reason than the apparent continuation of the same valley, and range of hills on each side of it, to some distance considerably north- ward of the Dead Sea. For three days the track was one continued ascent — t. e* for more than fifty miles before we fairly turned away'to the right from the bed of the valley ; and we must therefore have reached a level so much above that of the Dead Sea, as to make it impossible that this could ever have been the course of the present river Jordan. On the se- cond day we passed a Bedouin encampment of the Oualad Said, who, observing the formidable extent of our numbers, were exceedingly civil and obliging, offered us milk, a hard kind of white cheese, and several kids, for sale. I could not observe that the '"■''^^^*^ 3EC 260 A VISIT TO THE EAST. tribes at all distinguish themselves by the colour of their tents, as the Highland clans were once known by the tartan plaid. The same dull, broad, dusky brown and white stripe appears to be common to the peninsula of Mount Sinai, the wilderness of Ju- dea, and the north and south of Syria. The features of these Arabs were very similar to those of the Alewins — the same wild, uncultivated, half cunning, half ferocious, untamed beings, and withal, in their way, shewing every symptom of a disposition to be very kindly and hospitable. Close to the tents was a patch of highly luxuriant meadow grass, upon which were a number of camels ; and here, for the first time, we saw several young camels grazing together with the old pnes. How such a creature as a camel could acquit itself of its gambols, or whether they ever indulged in a frolic, it had never occurred to us to inquire. But the activity of these animals, especially the young ones, as they were here grazing at large, was certainly surprising. This evening we encamped at the distance of a quarter of a mile from a tolerable fountain, surrounded by a number of little trees, and among them one solitary remarkable palm-tree. In civilised countries the stem of the palm-tree leaf can be profitably applied to so many uses, that, like the trees in many English counties where faggot wood is scarce, the trunk is docked and mutilated of its branches, to the great detriment of the real beauty of the tree. In Akaba, and elsewhere in the desert, where the use of palm branches is hardly known, the trees are too stunted to attain their full sym- metry. However, here by the water- side stood one noble solitary palm-tree, unshorn of its beauties; and though it is to be imagined that a grove of such trees would be little less stiff and formal than ihe groves of the mutilated Egyptian palms now appear, still the single tree, as it stood before us, was exceedingly CH. XVII.] FROM AKABA TO PETRA. 261 beautiful, and excited general attention. The foliage, when it has come to the perfection of its growth, takes the form of a sphere, like the old mace of the ancient knights ; to use an exact, though a less noble comparison, like the head of an onion allowed to run to seed ; or, with due deference to the real beauty of the tree, not unlike the figure of Atlas supporting the globe. The third day, at noon, we turned off to the right hand, and entered upon a hilly tract of country, lying at the foot of the princi- pal range of hills, from time ta time crossing several small ravines, but always evidently ascending up- wards to higher ground. About diree o'clock we obtained a near view of the pass, by which we were to ascend the mass of rocks that lay be- tween us and the city of Petra. On the left hand, in a singularly shaped hill, was an excavation ex- actly similar to those of which we afterwards saw such abundance in Petra itself. This was an ob- ject of great curiosity : it was the first substan- tial indication of our being near to the end of our journey, and an actual earnest of what we were very anxious, and full of eagerness, to see. We accordingly climbed up to it, searched indefatig- ably round and round for a concealed Latin in- scription, and at last could find nothing at all, with all our pains, but a rough-hewn square kind of room, with an ornamental fa9ade, of some design, certainly not Roman. Being quite satisfied that all immortalising discovery was here impracticable, we one by one abandoned the search, with a few won- ders and surmises as to the purpose for which it could have been designed, and so rejoined the main body of the Arabs and servants, who had already commenced preparations for a halt under the hill, through which there winded the narrow rocky ravine which we were to ascend on the morrow. To any 262 A VISIT TO THE EAST. keen pursuer of the knowledge that flows from curi- osity, it will be easily intelligible, that the eve of an entry into a city at once so wonderful, and so little blown upon by the breath of tourists, was a prospect quite sufficient to fill the mind, and to awaken many a train of thought, stretching forward and backward, either way ending in deep and mys- terious ways of Providence, unfathomed and un- fathomable by our intelligence. We had known Petra, by report, as a city of the dead ; and all we had seen of the desert tended to cast a still deeper mantle of wonder over the expected view ; and there- fore we waited, full of anticipation and anxious de- light, for the morning. It had been debated for some time whether the tents and the baggage should be taken over the pass, as being great lumber; the cunning sheick urging our leaving them behind, as shrewdly sus- pecting we should be less likely to stay long if we had only a stone excavation to sleep in. Happily, in this instance, a cabal was successfully raised in favour of the ba^age ; and in the morning, at the usual time, away we went, leaving nothing behind. The entrance to the narrow path by which we com- menced the ascent was very picturesque: — a dry water-course, hemmed in with steep hills, full of hil- locks and tufts covered with all kinds of shrubs and plants, among which were some luxuriant bushes of the oleander. Gradually the path grew less and less open, until we came to a hill, the ascent of which was so steep that it became necessary to dismount. Accordingly for some time we continued a mixed pedestrian and, I can hardly say, equestrian party. The infantry, however, being lighter in their move- ments than the camels, soon found themselves at some distance in advance of the main army ; and as we now began to be in no little doubt by which of CH. XTII.] FROM AKABA TO FETRA. 26S the numerous paths to advance, one of the fifteen guards, a light, active, and tolerably respectable- looking man for an Alewin, pointed out by signs, and by a multitude of words, hardly any of which were intelligible, that after turning to the right, and climbing up a very steep ascent, over broken rocks and loose stones, we should find a near way into the town of Petra. At all events, there was a chance of some variety; we should hear from our friends by what kind of path they came ; and we determined to try — Mr. H., Mr. M., and myself; Mr. M. armed with a long single-barrelled gun, Mr. H. with an immense knife, myself, as I am inclined to think in the safest condition, without any manner of weapon. As soon as we had reached the top of the rocks, we had before us a gentle sloping ascent for some space, with a distant view of some very noble craggy and precipitous peaks ; and when we had reached the summit of this slope, we found ourselves in a romantic heathery little val- ley, with a well-trodden footpath, leading down- wards by an easy slope; presently, as we walked rapidly along, we came to some apparently solid walls of masonry, crossing the valley as if for the purpose of forming cisterns of water. For any pur- pose of defence they must have been useless; but they were in too ruinous a condition to enable one who was no antiquary to decide upon their proper character. Advancing down this valley, the path- way appeared to continue even, and tolerably close to the little water-course, now dry, that meandered along it. About half a mile before coming in view of Petra, the path leaves this valley, ascends a hill, and continues over rough, heathery ground to a kind of open platform ; from whence, looking nearly due east, a group of rocks and sculptured ruins bursts upon the view, with a positive power which it is 264 A VISIT TO THE EAST. harcUy possible to suppose that inanimate nature could possess. We came up this prospect place, strag- gling, as the Curiatii pursued their enemy ; for my American companions, upon their national principle, were anxious to have the first view. As soon as we were together, and had stood for some time in mute astonishment at the indescribable grandeur of the wild spectacle before us, Mr. M. commenced a sort of skirmishing search into several tombs and exca- vations, that even here began to shew themselves in the rocks on each side of us. As he passed by one larger than the rest, and was about to inves- tigate it, up rose above a dozen of more cut-throat looking villains than a European can imagine — no gaol-delivery could possibly match them. As if sur- prise were familiar to them, they ran to the match- locks that were lying together, reared upright against the corner ; and from having been quietly seated round a low smothered fire of roots and weeds, they be- stirred themselves to slip their awkward long guns over their shoulders, and to tie their leather knife- belts about them ; and having done this, they came round Mr. M. : both parties perhaps equally aston- ished at so unexpected a greeting. Self possession is the secret of governing savages, Mr. M., who spoke a few words of die Arabic, saluted them, asked for some water, which was brought to him, and began talking to them ; telling them that Sheick Hussein and his Alewins were coming. To my- self, knowing that it is impossible to have a &ir chance where one cannot speak, the moment of their appearance was sufficient to spoil all enjoy- ment of the view; and being by no means cer- tain in my own mind that we were in the same route that our camels were to follow, I cordially wished they had never seen us. In fact, if it be possible to imagine any cordiality subsisting between CH. XVII.] PROM AKABA TO PETEA. 265 travellers and banditti, such may be readily conceived to have been our feelings towards our new friends* The cave out of which they came, the startling sus- picion witli which they had seized their guns and knives, their dark ruffian faces and Spanish brown skins, their uncouth knives and belts, in contrast with their white sheepskin dress, were calculated to inspire no very &vourable opinion. Such were our friends, to whom we could not be otherwise than profoundly civil, after the best eastern pattern we could remem- ber and practise. With a very small stock of Ara- bic between Mr. M. and myself, there commenced the best kind of dialogue we could carry on, about former visitors, the greatness of Sheick Hussein, of their own sheick, Yomgebel, of the large size of our own party, the number of our guns, the way by which we had come ; then of their own quarrels with their neighbours, whether the report was true that they were at war, whether they had been robbed^ who had robbed them, how many camels they had lost; and then, during the interval of these inqui* ries, of the answers to which we of course under- stood very little, we were obliged to fill up the de* ficiencies of our discourse by asking for watery until we were in danger of being drenched, if not seized on the spot by the dropsy.^ In short, all expedients were used to keep up dieir curiosity and friendship, until the arrival of the camels, for which I began to wish. We could not well remain where we were, and therefore determined upon de- scending the path, over which they, to our great re- gret, ceremoniously offered their services as guides. The labour of companionship became now not alto^ gether unamusing, diough I can never persuade my- self that we should not have been much more at our ease without them. Still, as they chose to come, and we could not say nay, the entertaining them was in A A ^66 A VISIT TO THE EAST. itself no contemptible adventure. When we had gone over nearly half a mile of descent we came to a solitary pillar that was recognised, as forming one of the views in Laborde's great work ; and we augured well from this that we were in the right track. Our stock of words and Bedouin ideas had now become fairly exhausted; we had literally nothing more to say to the men ; and they, finding we were no longer able to maintain them in conversation, and to keep them at a respectful distance, had begun to shew some ex-> ceedingly unpleasant symptoms of familiarity. I had noticed this, and was unable to find a remedy ; and being clearly of opinion, that the sooner our inter- view was ended, the better, I proposed to my friends that we should say we were tired, and that we would rest here at the pillar, for the Sheick Hussein to come with his camels, it being, as I thought, very imprudent to wander among the ruins with such companions ; we should here see the caravan the mo- ment it came in sight; and our new friends would then find cause to become more respectful. The counsel being considered good, for it was evident that we were losing power over the savages, we sat down; and as the way to be at home among the worst people, is, if possible, to appear as if you had not so much as an idea of them in your mind, I had fortunately my sketch-book with me, and b^an sketching the group of rocks (on the opposite page), which was afterwards finished firom another point, not materially altering the view. This stoical indifference, however, is somewhat hard to maintain outwardly when it has no strong root within to support it; still, amongst us, we managed to shew these wild men, tliat on the whole we did not very much mind them. I think my companions really did not mind them ; which was not my case, for I saw that their respect was evidently declining: one, for example. CH. XVII.] FROM AKABA TO PETRA. 267 lighted his match, and fired off his gun, and then looked at us with a sinister grin, to see if we heeded it ; another drew out his knife, and came to shew it us with a sort of ill-looking smile, as if he expect- ed we should not altogether relish the exhibition ; another used the word backshish, with a marked in- tonation of voice, and certain expressive winks at his companions; altogether their general tone had undergone a perceptible change: and 1 was there- fore exceedingly glad, under an aspect of as much indifference as could be maintained, to notice the first camel turning round the comer of the rock, whence these men had issued, together with the gay dress of the Egyptian servants, who soon followed. The moment that the camels fairly came in sight matters changed. The men then knew that we were not in their power, however much they might have wished it ; and presently the guns of our numerous sportsmen pursuing the shinar, or desert grouse, con- firmed them in the necessity of respectful conduct. It was for some time debated whether we should select tombs, and live in them ; but a happy panic, occasioned by a judicious report of scorpions, saved us from this discomfort; and descending about two hundred yards below the pillar, we found a nice open space, covered with grass, which soon obtained from our antiquarian friends the name of the an- cient forum. But whether the forum or not, it afforded a most comfortable encampment in the midst of the greatest wonders, in which man's han- diwork has been suffered to blend itself with the nobler works of the Creator. CHAPTER XVIIL FETRA, OR WADI M0U8A. Petra, since its first discovery by Burckhardt in 1814, has been so thoroughly examined by other visitors to this portion of the Asiatic world, that it will be perhaps thought, that but little element of novelty can now remain for the report of any pre- sent or future visitor. I do not think so ; but you shall judge, Petra is, as it were, one of the great antiquarian enigmas of the world, whose true mean- ing the (Edipus, who approaches it, must guess from the first trial ; he will most likely never see it twice in his life. It may be easily understood, therefore, how great room there is for a variety of different conclusions. There are so many different objects, latent in the minds of travellers, of which they themselves are unconscious, until some un- expected circumstance or locality gives them birth, that I imagine centuries must elapse, and the high road of former traffic be restored through Idumea» before this city of the dead can cease to contain new wonders and fresh secrets, and to wear, on each successive visit, a mysterious and undeciphered aspect. It seems as if the seal had been purposely taken from off this singular testimony to the fulfil- ment of prophecy, at a period when a century set in over the whole of Christendom, strongly moving to- wards a practical denial of the great revealed truths given to mankind. As yet our knowledge of these ruins depends entirely upon the accuracy of such CH. XVIII*] PETRA, OR WADI MOUSA. 269 observations as have been crowded into stealthy visits, and obtained by great precaution, and not without some risk ; and although these have borne testimony to the superiority of modern over ancient research in the neatness of their execution, in the superiority of general knowledge, and the accuracy of historic, antiquarian, and scientific detail, it is clear that we are as far beneath our forefathers, in a sense of the mysterious majesty and the veiled deah'ngs of Almighty God, as stamped upon this land, as they are inferior to us in the mechanical means which we have used to render our surveys more complete than theirs. I mean, that the disco- very of Petra has been hailed by Christendom with much the same feelings that would have welcomed another Pompeii or Herculaneum excavated into existence, notwithstanding that it is so pregnant a witness to the reality of that judgment and ven- geance, which has been sent upon its people, and is, in fact, itself a citadel of inanimate prophets, lifting the mysterious veil of the past, and pro- claiming an indubitable certainty of what is to come. Nothing is however so possible as to survey these ruins in much the same spirit that a casual observer would look upon the Arch of Titus, or the Cloacse of Tarquin, or a row of Etruscan tombs. The hand of the Divine Majesty is ever receding from the presumptuous observer; nor is this in any degree less or more the case now than under the Jewish law itself. I can understand how an Israelite of those who remained after the captivity of Nebuchadnezzar, could look upon the ruins of their city, and yet be a total stranger to the sad and mournful lament of the prophet Jeremiah over it, and be blind to the great truths which the pro- phet discerned through the shadow of visible things, in which they are again veiled to us. That they A A 2 270 A VISIT TO THE EAST. were so blinded is clear from their subsequent con- duct, and their treatment of the prophet. How- ever mysterious, therefore, the internal cause of these different states of blindness and light may be, I speak of their existence as somewhat to which the human race has never been a stranger at any period of the world's history, and which are perfectly com- patible with a great increase of scientific and artisan knowledge. Indeed, it is impossible to avoid the conviction, that a blindness to, or a devout belief in, the vengeance of Almighty God, as a practical vital principle of life, entering into the thoughts, and forming the character, has nothing whatever in com- mon with the love of scientific admeasurement and botanic research, that of late years has guided pil- grims to these holy regions ; or in other words, that it is one thing to fear, love, honour, and obey God, another to love philosophies and disputations of sci- ence falsely so called. Perhaps, on the whole, Burckhardt's description of the general effect of Petra, on a first view, is the most succinct and true : — " No where,'* says he, " is the extraordinary colour of these mountains more striking tlian in the road to' the tomb of Aaron, on Mount Hor, which overlooks Petra in all its extent. The rocks presented sometimes a deep, sometimes a paler blue ; sometimes occasionally streaked with red, or shaded off to lilac or purple ; sometimes a salmon colour was veined in waved lines and circles, witli crimson and even scarlet, so as to resemble exactly the colour of raw meat. In other places, there are livid stripes of yellow or bright orange ; and in some parts all the different colours were ranged, side by side, in parallel strata. There are portions also, with paler tints, and some quite white ; but these last seem to be soflt, and not good for pre- serving the sculpture. It is this wonderful variety CH. XVIII.] PETRA, OR WADI MOUSA. 271 of colour?, observable throughout the whole range of mountains, that gives to Petra one of its most characteristic beauties. The facades of the tombs, tastefully as they are sculptured, owe much of their imposing appearance to this infinite diversity of hues in the stone.*' Such is the spectacle which greets the European on first entering Petra. It may be added, that there is an agreeable contrast to this, in a fresh green extent of good grass, covering the valley and the broken ground that lies between the main ranges of rock, to which a considerable sprinkling of wild flowers, and no contemptible va- riety of flowering shrubs and leafy bushes contribute their charms. Close below our encampment flowed a bubbling little stream, springing froni the Ain Mousa, which is distant rather more than three miles. The rest of the day was spent in an eager ramble without any fixed object, simply to gain a good general notion of the situation and geo- graphy of the town, previous to commencing more minute and specific observations. In this manner our entire force spread itself over the mountains, -^some searching into the interior of the tombs ; some climbing up wherever there appeared to be a broken staircase in the side of the rock ; some, with their guns, in pursuit of the shinar and par- tridge ; some firing ball from rifles at the vultures and the eagles widi which the air is speckled, not to say darkened. So that it must remain jbl ques- tion, whether the human or the brute creation dwell- ing here, had the most reason to be surprised with the sudden influx of so great a party, and at the measures they took instantaneously upon their arrival, I had been so tired and ill, from the indigest- 272 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ible diet of hard biscuit and black coffee, and the dry hot air of the Valley of Arabah, that for some hours I was quite unable to join the ramblers ; but at last summoned courage, while there remained a little of the evening light, to take a stroll into the deep ravine, of which all previous accoimts have spoken in such rapturous terms. The ruin known as the great Corinthian Tomb, on the left hand, re- minded me of a Venetian palace — odd enough that a resemblance should exist between the mansions of the living and the dead ! There are many tombs of different designs adjoining it, but all of them in a wonderful manner occupy a stranger's eyes and mind. Advancing a little further, to a point where the ravine appeared to narrow itself, there lay on the right the still perfect semicircle of the amphi- theatre, the grass growing in tlie interstices of its seats. One is really at a loss, on seeing an object of this kind, so redolent of luxurious life, to asso- ciate it with the sepulchral grandeur of die neigh-^ bouring excavations. How came the inhabitants of Petra to possess at once so just and noble a sense of the majesty and solemnity of death, and yet evince, by this monument of pleasure, an equally keen zest for the vanities and frivolities of life ? Could it be, that the sepulchral generation had passed away, and diat a new and light-minded people had succeeded them ? What is there that remains to tell the tale ? I think the view from the steps of the theatre wonderful and sublime. The thick clusters of oleander and other bushes now almost prevented any further advance, and it became necessary to scramble through them ; when, suddenly, the khasne or treasury of Pharaoh bursts upon the eye. The effect is talismanic I believe all who have seen it are agreed, that no one object of art they have ever met with possesses the CH. XVIll.] PETRA, OR WADI MOUSA. 273 fascination of this. The eye is riveted upon it ; and I should think that even a Hottentot would invo- luntarily admire it. Possibly the real secret of its charm lies not so much in its intrinsic beauty, be- cause the design has been copied in Europe, and there fails to have the same fascination ; but in the intense contrast of the symmetry of human art with the dark frowning wildness of the ravine, the abrupt defile in which it is placed, and the towering mass of livid overhanging precipice from whence it is cut. The delicate rose-coloured tint of the stone, and the wonderful preservation of the carved work and outline, which is as sharp as when fresh from the chisel, — all contribute to draw out and heighten this charm. Its influence over the observer is so magical, that no one noticed, until afterwards, that a pillar was wanting. The several figures occu- pying the niches were so much defaced as barely to be known for figures. The chief of them is said to have been a statue of Victory. Some of our companions, in the evening, argued themselves into a belief that the ruinous state of these figures was owing to the gradual action of moisture, or some other perhaps internal cause of decay in the stone ; but with the recollection of the rich sculpture of the frieze, the moulding, the delicate ornaments of the Corinthian capitals, as sharp and as fine as on the day of its dedication, it was difficult to sub- scribe to such an opinion, except upon the theory of the wind and rain having experienced a period of ikonoclast zeal, during some part of its past history. It has been contrived by its architect, to be the first object that meets the eye on enter- ing Petra by this terrific ravine. We did not enter by this approach ; but when thus seen, I am in- clined to believe that nothing in the whole range of art can compare with it. It was now time to 274 A VISIT TO THE EAST. return to our tents, around which were collected a vast number of Abouseeton's people, not one whit less malefactorlike looking than our friends of the morning. They were in part seated, in part stand- ing, round two or three fires ; and apparently some grand subject of debate occupied them, for they continued in loud converse until a very late hour. We now enjoyed some amends for former ^embar- rassments. The Arabs were evidently surprised and awed at the guns and markmanship of our sportsmen, so much superior to their own; and it was exceedingly agreeable, to hear each person's own account of his rambles and discoveries. A suffusion of unanimity suddenly spread over the whole party, in which, general high spirits and gratification may have had some share ; but I ra- ther think the tnith to have been, that our demo- cratic spirit was for the moment annihilated, before even the inanimate grandeur of Petra, as the evil genius of Saul yielded for a time to the harp of Da- vid. A vast object lay before us, in which we had a common interest, wherein was matter of thought superior to that of every-day life ; and our republi- can disunion yielded unconsciously to its influence. So, for a short time, we became again a united and good-humoured party. We were all agreed, how much the reality had exceeded any conception we had dared to form on our way hither ; and were, as may be supposed, greatly anxious for the morning, in order to enjoy an entire day's ramble among the mysteries and wonders of the scene. Mr. M. had before mentioned, that he had been taken into the town by a narrow passage, differing certainly from the great ravine, over which the large archway is thrown across, as being impracticable for a camel. As this entrance appeared not to have been laid down upon Laborde's map, Mr. Clarkson and my- CH. XVIII.] PSTRA, OB WADI MOUSA. 275 self resolved that in the morning, as soon after sun- rise as possible, we would entrust ourselves to Mr. M/s guidance, and explore the passage by which he had entered. The sun rose unclouded ; and as no one appeared to be in movement, Mr. Clarkson accom- panied me to the great Corinthian tomb and its neighbours, which we searched thoroughly before break&st. The tombs were all exceedingly dirty within, smelling of bats and vermin, and doubtless abounding in both. Here and there were the pale grey remains of a wood fire, indicating that now and then the present inhabitants sought security in them. The great tomb, which the day before had struck me, as not unlike one of Palladio*s or Vignola's Italian palaces, contains several chambers, one of which greatly exceeds the rest in size. It is be- lieved to have been a Christian church, but neither of us observed the inscription which is said to re- cord its consecration; without, is a platform raised upon archways, many of which are still perfect, some falling to decay. Indeed, the traveller must in almost every instance be much perplexed at the incongruous taste of the Idumean people, possessed of so much general good judgment for exterior beauty, and a spirit so acquiescent in internal dis- comfort. It was nearly nine o'clock when we re- turned from this survey ; and, after a hasty break- fast, Mr. M., accompanied with several other friends, came to summon us. In a short time, away we started to the eastward, passing the great tomb on our right. At first the ground was tolerably open ; but as we advanced, the valley appeared to narrow itself, and we followed for some time the dry bed of a little water-course. Had we continued this course, it would have led to the foot of the hills that form the eastern barrier between Petra and the desert ; but at less than half a mile to the east 876 A VISIT TO THE EAST. of the great tomb, the guides pointed out a path, by which we scrambled up to a amall table -lantl of rock, commanding a fine view of the western rocks (plate, page 266) ; and crossing this, we came in view of a solitary archway, thrown over a chasm in the rack, in a position more singularly wild and majestic than any we had yet seen in the midst even of Petra. The annexed drawing necessarily fives a very imperfect representation of the scene. t was sketched in haste ; for large parties are ever impatient in the matter of waiting for a drawing, and I could not well remain long behind them. We were here entirely out of the region of ttKobs. Indeed, this solitary arch was the only visible trace of human labour having approached the spot. Un- CH. XVIII.] PETRA, OR WADI MOU8A, 277 derneatfa it, at a great depth below, trickled a stream, so weak that a little further on, it expired in the porous sandy bed of its own course. We were for some time under the mistake that this was the archway described by M. Laborde as crossing the main entrance ; but on descending into the ra- pine, and scrambling under it, it was clear that no beast of burden, much less a camel, could even come here, or if brought here, could ever move away. I greatly regretted my inability to trace this cleft to its source ; but some penalty must be paid for the protection of a great party, and the cry having arisen to advance, it became necessary to de- sist. I am unable, therefore, to say whether there may or not be another footpath entrance into Petra, by this chasm, approaching from some point a little more to the north east, nor could the Arab guides tell me. A very few yards below the archway, this cleft united with another ; but where they terminated when formed into one, I am equally unable to say. I never sub- sequently saw any opening to be identified with them. The clef^ we now followed appeared to lead towards the E. S. E., and was so narrow, as in some places hardly to afford space for more than a single man. Here and there were several bushes, and in one place the overhanging rocks had fallen in such a manner as to render a scramble indispensable in order to regain the channel. Our path proved a continual ascent for more than a quarter of a mile from the archway ; and we noticed, as we went along, the remains of a groove or water-course, cut in the side of the rock, appa- rently intended for the supply of some part of the town, exactly similar to one, which we afterwards observed in the side of the grand ravine. We now found ourselves at the foot of a broad sloping hill of bare sandstone, covered towards the summit with B B 278 A VISIT TO THB EAST. some scanty withered grass. Here we stayed awhile to look back upon the scene we had come through, and had time to cast an eye at our guides. In their sheepskin attire, each with his matchlock loosely slung over the shoulder, the bright brass rings that fasten the barrel to the long wooden stock glittering in the sun, their sword-belts stuffed with two or three variously shaped knives, and their barbarously ornamented accoutrements of powder-horn, &c., — tfiey were a company from whom it seemed great extravagance to expect protection. One man, in particular, had a more diabolically sinister face than I have ever seen, or indeed hope to see again. It were to have been wished, that he had belonged to some different order of the creation, the progeny of Asmodeus, or of some other evil spirit, for it was painful to share Adam's nature with such a being ; his face alone would have condemned him before any European jury. One of the company had borrowed this man's knife, out of curiosity ; and on returning it to him, the man made a feint of being about to stab him, throwing himself into the attitude of an assassin, with an appropriate look and gesture, in its way perfect : then immediately afterwards, the fel- low burst into a horse laugh ; for he had certainly succeeded in frightening the Italian gentleman upon whom he had tried the experiment. Ascending the hill, we came to what we little expected, a cultivated valley, exhibiting traces of considerable labour. Its sides were terraced in a manner somewhat similar to the present state of the hills and valleys of Judea ; below flowed a plentiful stream, looking wonderfully fresh and pleasant after the dry yellow ground of the desert, of which we had seen so much. A rough-looking Fellah wa& ploughing a patch of sloping ground close to us, with a couple of oxen attended by as many boys CH. XVIII.] PETRA, OR WADI HOUSA. 279 — the plough rude enough in all conscience. Here and there a few other men were dispersed over the field, very industriously weeding a crop of grain, that was already some little height above the ground. These men, peaceable as were their occupations, were still armed; and reminded us of the Jews under Ezra, rebuilding their temple and city walls with swords by their sides. Avoid- ing to tread over the wheat, which, though thin, was green and healthy, we found our way down to the brook, and now discovered that this was the stream which flows through the grand ravine. We seemed to have completely escaped from the rugged rock that forms as it were a nest for the town, and were once more in the midst of cultivation. A little dis- tance above the spot where we came down upon the brook, it divides into two streams ; and in the south- ernmost valley, about half a mile higher up, were the black striped tents of an encampment of Fel- lahs from forty to fifty tents strong. As we had no peculiar wish for their acquaintance, we contented ourselves by climbing up the hill that divides the two rivulets, to gain a view of the situation they had chosen ; and could not avoid being pleased with the evident signs of an industry directed by some intel- ligence. The terraces were raised with consider- able labour, and were covered with olive, fig, and possibly other fruit trees, intersected by numerous small channels, along which the water of the stream that is said to come from a fountain named Ain Mousa, is spread over the whole of their cultivated domains. It seems as if agricultural knowledge was the first and the truest knowledge for mankind, and natural to them however savage. Indeed, I very much question whether agricultural and pastoral tribes are ever really savage : ignorant of certain habits known to civilised nations, they certainly 2H0 A VISIT TO THE EAST. may be, but so were the ancient patriarchs. The savage element belongs rather to the occupation of hunting ; hence the Red Indian is a far more bar- barous savage,- a more bloodthirsty and malignant being in his pleasures, than either the Turcoman or the Kourd. As for the Bedouins, there is a birth- taint in their race, and they inherit a peculiar family temper : their father was a wild man ; his hand was against every man, and every man's hand against him. I have no doubt, that had we been able to speak to these tillers of the soil, we should have found them to be a much more domestic, solid, and happy people, than our own attendants the Alewins ; and this in defiance of great oppressions, and the warlike habits, by which they are driven to defend their scanty crops. The stream that on our coming into Petra had been entirely swallowed up in watering their grounds, was now, out of compliment to us, allowed to return to its course ; and since we had decided upon not risking our reception at the village, we determined to explore the ravine. Descending, therefore, along the water side, we came one by one past various tombs, the drawings of which may be found in M. Laborde's work, and recognised them with ease, from the great faithfulness with which they have been taken. As we were standing near the tomb that is surmounted with several stones of a pyramidical form, we were taken by surprise at the unexpected appearance of a camel, laden with paniers, and driven by two Syrian- faced Arabs. Our servants stopped the men ; and presently it appeared that they were merchants from Ghaza ; and that they were taking oranges to Akaba, for sale to the Hadj, or Mecca pilgrims, who were expected to come in about a week. It must be some strange portentous occasion — and such rarely occur — when an Englishman's appe- CH. XVIII.] PETRA, OR WADI MOUSA. 281 Ute is overcome by his cariosity. I remember an occasion when only one passenger preferred to re-' main on deck, on passing the Giant's Causeway, in preference to answering the steward's summons to the cabin dinner. Is there any favourite point of view in England which does not afford a ready index to its popularity in the number of nutshells and other such remnants of provision, which, in that country, are considered indispensable acces* sories to the picturesque, and necessary to the full enjoyment of the beauties of nature ? The moment therefore the orange merchant came in view, there ensued a suspension of all zeal in favour of the ruins. Two for a piastre was the price we paid (t. e, a penny a piece) ; and no doubt the camel had great reason to rejoice at the meeting, for its burden over the moun- tain road to Akaba must have been considerably lighter. We were, however, no little surprised at see- ing a camel at all, and much more at soon meeting a whole string of camels, with their drivers, on their way to Akaba, — perhaps as many as forty, with nearly the same number of attendants; and still more at hearing, that though far from a common route, it was by no means unusual for caravans to pass through Petra, and to prefer the mountain road to Akaba, to the way by the plain. A late popu- lar writer upon prophecy^ had, we remembered, re- presented the country as never trodden by the foot of man, — that it was death to attempt it. How came it, then, to be from time to time a caravan route ? Here was an undoubted mistake ; for the merchants were evidently unconscious of any great risk. It appeared, on inquiry, that they were travelling un- der the protection of the Alewin tribe ; and were on friendly terms with the Fellahs of Wadi Mousa, who » Dr. Keith. B B 2 282 A VISIT TO THE EAST. look for their arrival with much interest, as the means of effecdng some very necessary barters, and even purchases. The mountain fastnesses are really the safest route, when the protection of the ruling tribe is obtained ; and since the Alewins derive a considerable revenue from the passage of the Hadj, these mer- chants, who were carrying stores to meet them on their return, enjoyed iiiU protection, and were no doubt thinking of any thing ratlier than the vicinity of danger. When we had taken leave of these men, who, with their fine ruddy complexions and sleek features, of- fered a singular contrast to our own tawny coloured guides, we entered the much celebrated ravine. The archway that is thrown over the opening of this peculiar chasm is a beautiful object, and yet, from its singular height, prepares the traveller to forget all artificial objects in the wonders of die ravine. The little stream had been partly turned into it, and consequently afforded us much amusing trouble to scramble through dry shod. Though it has been well described by M. Laborde, I think it beyond the power of words to convey to a reader the sensation of mute wonder, which this cleft of the rock im- presses upon the beholder. Language is too meagre to be adequate to the task. The huge frowning masses of overhanging rocks, bearing every colour of Joseph's coat, and of every shape, communicate a deep and terrific gloom to die pass. Here and there a gleam of the sun breaks in, as if to con- vince the gloom of its gloominess. It is very zig- zag and crooked, and requires nearly ten minutes' fast walking to go through it. At the end there comes in view that beauty of beauties, the Khasne : it is from this approach that the contrast is com- plete. We returned now to our tents for a few biscuits ; and afterwards my companions dispersed CH. XVHI.] PETRA, OR WADI MOUSA. 283 in all directions, some shooting, some exploring: I went and busied myself in sketching, which occu- pied me until darkness drove me into the tent for the night. CHAPTER XIX. PETRA — THIRD AND FOURTH DAYS. The following morning unfortunately turned to storm and rain. The evening had set in dark and threat- ening ; and during tlie night the tents had been so shaken by the violence of the wind, that we feared they would not have stood. The rain, too, came down in such torrents, that we were unable to leave the precarious shelter they afforded ; nor would there have been much gratification in going out, for the rocks were * totally hidden ; in fact, so thick for some time was the mist and rain, that I can compare it to nothing, but the thick grey gloom that now and then accompanies a November snow-storm in Great Britain. Happily, this gloom did not last, although the rain continued as violent as ever ; and by contriving an eye-hole in the wall of the tent, I was enabled to complete the first day's unfim'shed sketch, a work that occupied me the whole of the morning very busily. In the afternoon, although it still continued very showery, we determined if possible to accomplish the ascent of the £1 Derr, or monastery, as the natives term an excavation very similar in form to the Khasne, which is found at the top of one of the hills, that lay to the north west of our encampment, and of which they even spoke with some admiration. Descending from the platform upon which we were encamped, and following the CH. XIX.] FETRA THIRD AND FOURTH DAYS. IS85 brook for some distance, a little below the turn which it makes to the right, it is joined by another small stream, flowing down a tributary valley full of the oleander and other shrubs, and abounding in tombs, the design of which struck me as more an- cient than any we had hitherto seen. One of our friends had found the day before a curious inscrip- tion in a character which no one appeared to know, cut in five lines upon a tablet, on the exterior of one of the tombs. Fortunately we happened to meet with him in this valley ; and he kindly under- took to shew us the tomb. In a short time we came to it, having at first strayed some little dis- tance beyond. It is cut, like several others that are close to it, in the deep red sandstone rock. Here, again, a penalty was to be paid for a large party. I had barely time to make a small and imperfect sketch, and to copy a very small part of the inscription, when the signal was given to march in quest of the £1 Derr ; and as I had no reason to suppose that this had been overlooked by M. Laborde, but fully expected to find a copy of the whole inscription in his work, there seemed the less pretext to beg to be allowed to finish my task. The tomb itself appears originally to have been en- tered by a small doorway ; so, at least, we con- cluded from the resemblance of the general feature of its design to others that have small doorways. The greater part of the whole fa9ade is fallen away, and displays the usual empty ill-cut chamber, the abode of bats, and all vermin to whose life extreme damp is not destructive. Retracing our steps a little way down the vaUey, we climbed over a rough ridge of red rock, by turn- ing to the right, and descended into another narrow and apparently more precipitous ravine than the one from which we had come. A little torrent was for- 286 A VISIT TO THE EAST. cing its way to join the main stream, which I shouU conceive to have been about a hundred yards below. Here, again, the rain set in with more violence than ever, and we lost sight of every object that would explain the course which our guides took ; it con- tinued, however, I well remember, up the same nar- row valley for some distance, when turning suddenly round to the left, and following for a little while the course of another rivulet, we again turned off to commence the ascent. To describe the path by which, after about half an hour's constant climbing, we came to £1 Derr, I acknowledge to be im- possible; but clouded as we were by mist, and little able to judge of the full grandeur of the scene, I question whether any other part of the globe con- tains the same wildness of mountain chasm, as that through which our way now led us, partly by gal- leries cut in the rock, partly by steps, the traces of which were occasionally very perfect. It seemed as if the jaws of the earth herself, to borrow an image familiar to the Latin poets, were here open. The ramble of the day before had not shewn us in the same degree the real nature of this eagle's nest of Edom. The multitude of tombs and excavations that abounded in every overhanging mass of rock was sufficient to warrant a theory, of the place having been a universal cemetery of the nations of the East. At length we came to the object of our search, the El Perr ; and although it has not the same gentle beauty with the Khasne, its position on '* the height of the rock," commanding a noble view over the valley, gives it a peculiar and extraneous charm, that claims ivhatever admiration a fastidious architectural critic might refuse to it as a work of art. It is inferior to the Khasnd certainly, in chasteness and simple purity of design ; but the observer must be gifted with a very sifting and disdainful genius, who shall 1 CH. XIX.] PETRA THIRD AND FOURTH DATS. 287 Stop to consider column and frieze, in the midst of so noble a group of nature's rocks, in which it stands^ the single solitary contrast of man's research and labour after beauty. We were doomed to experience several disappointments : the sun, that for a moment seemed on the point of gaining a victory over the rain, was again clouded, and drove us into the shelter of a large excavation almost in face of the £1 Derr, from whence the annexed sketch was taken. It is uncertain to what century these monuments may belong ; but Greek taste and workmanship are evi< dent in them both. It was interesting to find a remembrance of our own country in the names of several countrymen written in a corner of the excavation, amongst them that of the celebrated artist D. Roberts. There was also an in-^ scription in large black letters, which at first sight, from its occupying the entire breadth of the wall, we thought could be nothing less than the title and genea- logy of the tutelary spirit of the edifice ; but on nearer inspection, it proved to be the name of a worthy citi- zen of Boston, United States, America. Now the pro- pensity to leave some memorial behind is most ge- neral; and unquestionably the motive for raising a mighty mausoleum is of the same order and kin with that which dictates a lead-pencil inscription on the corner of a statue. Something must be done whereby others may think of us. The Christian faith alone is rich in unseen motives, and the Church alone can tell of lives devoted to an object, which does not admit any visible memorial to bear witness of it. This is the rare and precious hidden life of religion. The common run of mankind must leave something behind them; and the desire to do so, appears to be univers^. Absalom had no son to keep his name in remembrance (2 Sam. xviii. 18), and therefore he reared himself a pillar in the king's )B88 A VISIT TO THE EAST. vale, and called the pillar after his own name ; the patriarch raised an ^tar of stones in memory of a vision, at the outset of his exile to Chaldea ; the Transjordanic tribes a pillar, in token that they were a true part of Israel ; and the citizen of Boston, of the United States, America, writes his name with a burnt stick, to preserve the memory of his visit to Petra. It would be a curious inquiry, to ascertain among which of the Asiatic tribes the strongest propensity to write their names could be found. In this pecu- liarity we English certainly excel all other people of Europe ; and with their consanguinity to us, the citizens of America have received a double portion. It is clearly a very favourite practice also with the Arabs, as all wells and caravanseras on the Hadj route, which abound in Arab autographs, can testify. On the walls of the pyramids and other ruins of Egypt, it is difficult to determine whether Europe or Asia numbers the most inscriptions ; at all events, here is a point of common humanity, in which the sons of Shem and Japheth resemble each other, and in whidi they differ from the sons of Ham ; for I have not been able to learn that any genuine African tribes possess this native talent for writing their names. On our way down, we employed ourselves as di- ligently as we could, in prying into each tomb that we passed, and were yet unable to discover the slightest interior architectural ornaoient. Indeed, it was but rarely that the ground plan extended to more than one large apartment, and in one or two instances only to three chambers, that lay in a lateral direction, pa- rallel with the outer surface of the rock, in this re- spect differing from the Egyptian excavations, whose inner chambers retire directly into the heart of the rock. The designs for the exterior were exceedingly various ; and it far surpassed my powers of judg- CH. XIX.] PETRA THIRD AND FOURTH DAYS. 289 ment to determine, from their character, the date of their construction. Though the evening continued very rainy, we still spent it pleasantly, in discussing and reporting pro- gress amongst each other. One little circumstance shall be mentioned, illustrative of a fulfilment of one item of the Scripture prophecy respecting Edom. In the evening, on retiring to bed, and being about to spread a macintosh over my clothes, as a mea- sure of precaution against the rain, in case it should be very heavy in the course of the night, a scorpion dropped out. Mr. C. was so eager to slay it, that it was with difficulty I could intercede that the exe- cution might not take place on my carpet. It was, however, soon slain; and it made us very uneasy with the thought that there must be numbers all around us. Fortunately the morning was without rain ; and though the clouds still hung dark and thick over us, I think I never remember to have breathed so fresh and elastic an air. I started early, in company with Mr. M., to visit a chamber ornamented with fluted pilasters, — the only instance which had yet been found of an ornamented interior. We came to it in less than half an hour, and found it to be the same of which Laborde has given a sketch and descrip- tion. The annexed plate gives a view of the interior, and shews the style of ornament adopted, which, from the crumbling flaky nature of the richly veined red stone in which it is excavated, is now in a very imperfect state. Close to the floor, the carved work has fallen away much more than the drawing represents. The stone enclosures appear to have served the same purpose as those which we found in the cave from whence I had sketched the £1 Derr, the day before ; viz. as rude enclosures for sheep* Afler the sketch was complete, we climbed further c c 290 A VISIT TO THE EAST. up the ravine, and came to a cistern, the sides of which were covered with a hard and firm cement. At last Mr. M. proposed that we should try the ex- periment of climbing up the hill. We were quite willing for the adventure, only our guide persisted in saying there was no way (Mafish, sikki; sikkij mafish /) ; but on our resolutely commencing an as- cent, he came with us, and shewed us a very curious path that led round a narrow ledge, without any kind of balcony, where a false step would have precipi- tated us a hundred feet into the valley below. The rest of the ascent was free from unprotected pre- cipices, and curious in the extreme, as bringing us at every corner to remains of staircases and passages, and even to little plots that once were gardens, al- though the soil had been long ago washed away. In about a quarter of an hour we came to the top of a rock, from whence we had a full view of the Acro- polis. The only parts which remain in tolerable preservation are the two bastions to the west. To- wards the south and east its walls are in complete ruins. We walked round the building, and were a good deal perplexed to understand, to what sort of purpose it was suited ; on the north all traces of its walls were totally gone ; and, in fact, it was in too ruinous a state to admit of being deciphered by such inexperienced spectators. Our friends in the valley had sent messengers, who now came with the intelligence that they had determined to depart, but it was convenient not to understand them ; and ac- cordingly we hurried on. I should strongly recom- mend any future visitor to make this his first point ; for it commands a complete view of the rocky nest in which Petra lies, and would greatly explain any sub- sequent ramble he might afterwards make, through the almost numberless chasms and defiles in both the eastern and western range of rocks. The annexed CH. XIX.] PETRA — THIRD AND FOURTH DAYS. 291 plan, which may suffice to give a general idea of the city, has been constructed from a bird's eye sketch taken from this point. Descending from this ruined fort towards the south, we come down upon a platform of hewn rock, on which stood, cut apparently from the rock itself, two obelisk-shaped stones. Their Arabic name is Zob Pharaoun, or pillars of Pharaoh. So much yet remained to be seen in a direction which we had not explored, that we hurried along, advancing over the tops of this great mass of rocks, and though the sur- face was by no means smooth, yet no precipitous ravine intercepted our advance ; and almost each step disclosed fresh wonders. There were on all sides vestiges of passages cut in the rock, steps and terraces, with the remains of cultivated patches of ground, that fancy quickly transformed into gardens and public resorts; and on one spot we came to a crop of wheat, growing certainly rather scantily, and yet evidently sown there, not without some labour and regularity. Having rambled about for some time, we held a council whether we should not act as if we had never heard the summons to pack up, and start for some distant point, to ascertain where the ridge of peculiar red rock terminated to the south, and if possible to reach the boundary of the culti- vable ground. But it was decided against me, that this would be incurring too great a risk. Accord- ingly, against our inclinations, for all were inclined for the ramble, had it not been necessary to return, we descended by a wild narrow gorge, in which we found the remains of a spacious way of stone steps, indicating it to have been a very frequented road to the habitations on and in the rocks above, and at last came out by the amphitheatre. When we returned, we found the camp in a fer- ment, occupied with packing, payment of guides, and 292 A TISIT TO THE EAST. every other preparation for iminediate departure. It is certainly strange, that so large a party, whose sole object had been a visit to this one metropolis of an extinct and once great people, and ader havii^ come safely and agreeably to it, in numbers and under circumstances which entirely superseded the precau- tions that other travellers appear to have found in- dispensable, should now evince such an irresistible and almost unanimous eagerness to depart. No one, I am sure, would have ventured to say, that he had explored one fourth part of the ravines, winding stair^ cases, and interminable labyrinths of chasms, which exist and are still unknown. But, mixed companies, I presume, will never, while the world lasts, be able to afford any rational explanation of their move- ments : the determination is taken, each one falls in, and the result is as haphazard as the origin id concealed and uncertain. Nevertheless, during the time we had spent there, we had enjoyed many privileges, owing to our numbers, which few sub- sequent visitors can expect to possess. Our Ger- man companions were well provided with all manner of guns and rifles ; and Uieir marksmanship had excited universal wonder among men who had no- thing but clumsy matchlocks. The second day of our arrival, an eagle had been shot with a rifle ball from a great height ; and this circumstance had no doubt its effect, for marksmanship is highly prized amongst them^ This therefore ensured to each individual perfect liberty to wander wherever he pleased ; and I do not remember to have heard of a single act of incivility committed by any one of the guides. They received ten piastres each a day for their services, and seemed on the whole content. Their people also brought milk and cheese for sale to the encampment, with a very tolerable grace; and a brace of shinar was offered, and, if I reman*- CH. XIX,] PETRA THIRD AND FOURTH DAYS. 293 ber right, purchased. I should have been greatly delisted to have spent two more days in mak- ing a collection of drawings of the fa9ades of the different tombs, with a view of gaining some data to determine their comparative antiquity ; but as there was no remedy, so it was worse than useless to feel any disappointment. And indeed, all displeasure was soon lost in the magnificent prospect which we enjoyed on reaching the summit of the hills, that form the south-western boundary between Petra and the Arabian desert. We were on the same track by which the camels had entered, the day of our adventure by the shorter path: and as it led past the foot of Djebel Haroun, or Mount Hor, our friends prepared for the ascent. Unfortunately my Turkish shoes were too far worn, by trampling in the wet the day before, to bear so rugged an ascent. Their re- port was, that they had found Aaron's tomb exactly as other travellers have described it — an ugly, sub- terraneous room, with a grating over the tomb itself. They did not, however, encounter any of the great perils which Mr. Stephens was happy enough to sur- vive, nor did we generally find the same dangers which he has so courageously surmounted, in his nar- rative. We were to encamp in the evening, in the same spot where four days before we had encamped, full of excited anticipations of what we were about to see ; and in now looking back upon them, I must acknowledge the reality to have far surpassed the wildest conception we then dared to form. We were on the top of the ridge, and about to take a farewell view of the rocky peaks of Petra. Each step of descent was gradually interposing a thick curtain between us and them; and soon even the topmost peak of its red craggy rocks was hid from view. There is an involuntary sorrow in taking the last actual farewell view of scenes, whose grandeur c c 2 294 A VISIT TO THE EAST. we may^ never expect again to see equalled on earth ; and yet the prospect, for which we had ex- changed the rocks of Petra was in every way a won- derfully peculiar one. To the west lay tie wide colourless plain of the Arabian wilderness, losing itself in the indistinct maze of an horizon, whose tints could scarcely be distinguished from the dis- tant sands of the desert; while the abrupt broken character of the ground that we were descending, with its yellowish, sickly verdure, its different co- loured soils, that the rains had washed bare, were at once a total contrast, both to the wild rocks we had quitted, and to the almost boundless expanse that lay before us. CHAPTER XX. OF THE PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM, AND THEIR FULFILMENT. Petra, the long concealed capital of a people now swept away from the face of the earth, and taken from the land of the living, has, besides its material wonders, another element of interest. It is a testi- mony to the historic truth of holy Scripture, and to divine prophecy. Many centuries have now elapsed since it was the chief city of a distinct people, at dif- ferent times the rival, subject, and enemy, of Israel ; as their respective patriarchs, Jacob and Esau, had been to each other, during their lifetime ; and in the mean time the course of God's providence has been wonderfully revealed. For their rebellion and pride, the nations of the earth were caused to speak differ- ent languages, and to become different people ; and now they are again called from their tribes, and kin- dreds, and people, by one baptism, to be once again one people, a holy and peculiar people, a catholic or universal church of God. Diversity was visited upon man as a punishment ; catholic tmity is restored to him as a blessing. Indeed, amid the endless per- plexity of people and kindreds, nations and lan- guages, tribes and families, countries and climates, the traveller looks in vain for any element of unity, except the visible Church of Christ, his kingdom, which is not of this world, and yet dwells among the kingdoms which are of this world. Tlie whole 296 A VISIT TO THE EAST. world besides is but a continuation of the confusion of Babel. The Church alone is the city that is at unity with itself; and yet even here what discord has not Satan sown ! Petra, therefore, as the once populous capital city of a contemporary people, and a branch of the same stock, with the Church that preceded the catholic Church of Jesus Christ, has a great interest to the catholic Christian. It is a substantial, visible testimony to the reality of that dispensation, which went before to prepare the way for his own, and a witness of the divine power of the Holy Ghost, who spake, by the mouth of the Jewish prophets, those judgments upon Edom, her city and people, which are now so signally fulfilled. The principal passages from the prophetic writ- ings are as follow : TTie blessing of Isaac upon Edom, Gen. xzvii. 39, 40. " Behold, thy dwelling snail be the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of heaven from above ; and by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother : and it shall come to pass, when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck.'' The prophecy of Balaam, Num. xziv. 18. ^^ And Edom shall be a possession ; Seir also shall be a pos- session for his enemies." Joel iii. 19. '^ Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the child- ren of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land." Amos i. 11. '' Thus saith the Lord, For three trans- gressions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof: because he did pursue his bro- ther with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually, and he kept his wrath for ever. But I wul send a fire upon Teman, which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah." Isaiah xxxiv. 5-17. '' For my sword shall be bathed in heaven : behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the x>eople of my curse, to judgment. The CH. XX.] PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM. 297 sword of the Lord is filled with blood ; it is made fat with fatness, and with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidnej^s of rams; for the Lord hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Idumea. And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls ; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. For it is the day of the Lord's ven- geance, and the year of recompenses for the contro- versy of Zion. And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch. It shall not be quenched night nor day : the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste : none shall pass through it for ever and ever : but the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it ; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it : and he shall stretch out upon it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness. They shall call the nobles thereof to the kingdom, but none shall be there, and all her princes shall be nothing. And thorns shall come up in her pa- laces, nettles and brambles in the fortresses thereof; and it shall be an habitation of dragons, and a court for owls. The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the island, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow ; the screech-owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest. There shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow : there shall the vultures also be gathered, every one with her mate. Seek ye out of the book of the Lord, and read ; no one of these shall fail, none shall want her mate : for my mouth it hath commanded, and his spirit it hath gathered them. And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath divided it unto them by line : they shall possess it for ever, from generation to generation shall they dwell therein." Jeremiah xlix. 7-22. ** Concerning Edom, thus saith the Lord of hosts. Is wisdom no more in Teman ? is counsel perished from the prudent ? is their wisdom vanished ? Flee ye, turn back, dwell deep, O inhabi- tants of Dedan ; for I will bring the calamity of Esau upon him, the time that I will visit him. If grape- iS98 A VISIT TO THE EAST. gatherers come to thee, would they not leave some ^leaning-grapes ? if thieves by night, they will destroy till they have enough. But I have made Esau bare, I have uncovered his secret places, and he shall not be able to hide himself: his seed is spoiled, and his breth- ren, and his neighbours, and he is not. Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them alive ; and let thy widows trust in me. For thus saith the Lord, Behold, they whose jud^ent was not to drink of the cup have assuredly drunken ; and art thou he that shall altogether go unpunished? thou shalt not ffo unpun- ished, but thou shalt surely drink of it. For I have sworn by myself, saith the Lord, that Bozrah shall be- come a desolation, a reproach, a waste, and a curse ; and all the cities thereof shall be perpetual wastes. I have heard a rumour from the Lord, and an ambassador is sent unto the heathen, saying. Gather ye together, and come against her, and rise up to the battle. For, lo, I will make thee small among the heathen, and de- spised among men. Thy tembleness hath deceived tnee, and the pride of thine heart, O thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, that boldest the height of the hill : though thou shouldest make thy nest as high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from thence, sai& the Lord. Also Edom shall be a desolation : every one that goeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss at all the plagues thereof. As in the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighbour cities thereof, saith the Lord, no man shall abide there, neither shall a son of man dwell in it. Behold, he shall come up like a lion from the swelling of Jordan a^inst the habitation of the strong : but I will suddenly make him run away from her : and who is a chosen man, that I may appoint over her? for who is like me ? and who will appoint me the time ? and who is that shepherd that will stand be- fore me ? Therefore hear the counsel of the Lord that he hath taken against Edom, and his purposes that he hath purposed against the inhabitants of Teman : Surely the least of the flock shall draw them out ; surely he shall make their habitations desolate with them. The earth is moved at the noise of their fall ; at the cry the noise thereof was heard in the Red Sea. Behold, he CH. XX.] PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM. 299 shall come np and fly as the eagle, and spread his wings over Bozrah : and at that day shall the heart of the mighty men of Edom be as the heart of a woman in her pangs." Ezekiel xxv. 12-14. <' Because that Edom hath dealt against the house of Judah by taking vengeance, and hath greatly offended, and revenged himself upon them ; therefore thus saith the Lord God, I will also stretch out mine hand upon Edom, and will cut off man and beast from it ; and I will make it desolate from Teman ; and they of Dedan shall fall by the sword. And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel: and they shall do in Edom accord- ing to mine anger, and according to my fury ; and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord God." Ezek. xxxii. 29. *' There is Edom, her kings, and all her princes, which with their might are laid by them that were slain by the sword : they shall lie with the uncircumcised, and with them that go down to the pit.'' Ezek. XXXV. *' Moreover, the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and prophesy against it, and say unto it, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, O Mount Seir, I am against thee, and I will stretch out mine hand against thee, and I will make thee most desolate. I wul lay thy cities waste, and thou shalt be desolate ; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord. Because thou hast had a perpetual hatred, and hast shed the blood of the child- ren of Israel by the force of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time that their iniquity had an end. Thererore, as I live, saith the Lord God, I will prepare thee unto blood, and blood shall pursue thee : sith thou hast not hated blood, even blood shall pursue thee. Thus will I make Mount Seir most desolate, and cut off from it him that passeth out, and him that re- tumeth. And I will fill his mountains with his slain men : in thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy rivers, shall they fall that are slain with the sword. I will make thee perpetual desolations, and thy cities shall not return : and ye shall know that I am the Lord. Because thou hast said. These two nations, and these two countries, shall be mine, and we will possess 900 A VISIT TO THE EAST. it ; whereas the Lord was there : Therefore, as I livey saith the Lord God, I will even do according to thine anger, and according to thine envy, which thou hast used out of thy hatred against them ; and I will make myself known among them, when I have judged thee. And thou shalt know that I am the Lord, and that I have heard all thy blasphemies which thou hast spoken against the mountains of Israel, saying. They are laid desolate, they are given us to consume. Thus witih your mouth ye have boasted against me, and have multiplied your words against me : I have heard them. Thus saith the Lord God, When the whole earth re- joiceth, I will make thee desolate. As thou didst rejoice at the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was desolate, so will I do unto thee : thou shalt be desolate, O Mount Seir, and all Idumea, even all of it ; and they shall know that I am the Lord." Obadiah ver. 1-3, 8, 9. " The vision of Obadiah. Thus saith the Lord God concerning Edom ; We have heard a rumour from the Lord, and an ambassador is sent among the heathen, Arise ye, and let us rise up against her in battle. Behold, I have made thee small among the heathen: thou art greatly despised. The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee, thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high ; that saith in his heart. Who shall bring me down to the ground ? . . . Shall I not in that day, saith the Lord, even destroy the wise men out of Edom, and understanding out of the mount of Esau? And thy mighty men, O Teman, shall be dismayed, to the end that every one of the mount of Esau may be cut off by slaughter." Malachi i. 1-6. " The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved you, saith the Lord : yet ye say. Wherein hast thou loved us ? Was not Esau Jacob's brother? saith the Lord : yet I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness. Whereas Edom saith, We are impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places; thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down ; and they shall call them, The border of wicked- CH, XX.] PB0PKECIE8 RELATING TO EDOM. 301 nefls, and, The people against wliom the Lord hath in- dignation for ever. And your eyes shall see, and ye shcdl say, The Lord will be magnified from the border of Israel." The owl and the bittern do now possess Petra, the chief city of Edom ; thorns and briers are come up in her palaces {vide plate, page 289), and scor- pions are there in multitudes. Are these predictions of the Jewish prophets fulfilled ? It is sufficient to ask, Where are the people of Edom ? They are per- ished. Edom is a desolate wilderness. The very city herself is called now by visitors a City of the ' Dead ; and her rock dwellings have been by most believed to be tombs of the dead. The history of the people, again, is a fulfilment of the prophecy of Isaac. They possessed a ter- ritory, which is literally the " fatness of the earth, and of the dew of heaven from above,** compared with the wide extent of sand east and west of it ; and they lived in alternate rebellion and subjection to Israel. During the several reigns of the kings of Israel, Edom endured many severe defeats; and a fierce hatred always existed between themselves and Israel. Later on, the cruelty of their revenge upon Judah, when that kingdom fell into the disorders preceding their captivity in Babylon, called forth many grievous prophetic messages, of the judgments that God would at the last bring upon them. " I will make Edom a desolate wilderness for this vio- lence against the children of Judah ; because they have shed innocent blood in their land*' (Joel iii. 19). And now I ask myself, Is this come to pass as was foretold, or not? ISdom is become a desolation : the travelling companies of Dedanim are no more ; its commerce is gone ; its people extinct ; its history wiped off from the records of the past. Itself is one vast sepul- chral metropolis, a city of tombs, the inhabitants of D D 302 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ifirhich, seem to have lived but to die, and to liave been without house or home until they were dead. In short, death with them might appear to have been the great aim of life, and the sepulchral urn their emblem of existence. If Damascus, Tyre, and Si- don, whose merchants were princes, and their trader^ kings of the earth ; if Jerusalem, whose monarch Solomon gathered gold and silver, and the pecu- liar treasure of kings, may have been the glory of the land of the living; Petra is the time-honoured monument of the solemnity of the land, where all things are forgotten, a rock-hewn cemetery of the dead, a city of refuge for death ! In a word, Jewish prophecy is fulfilled : there is hot a stain to be cast upon its evidence. If a mind there be, that cannot glean from this, the full assur-^ ance of the certainty of that dispensation which is now come, and does not learn to know itself, its own happiness and misery, to be involved in the same trial, subject to the same Almighty will, liable to his vengeance, and yet open to his mercy, — then there must be some moral leprosy within ; some disease that no appeal to intellectual truth of evidence can cure. It is one thing to cite the fulfilment of pro- phecy in victory and confidence, as a great and glori-^ ous testimony, reflecting a triumphal dignity upon the professor of a meek and lowly creed, confounding without converting a sceptical antagonist ; it is ano- ther to see and to realise the personal truth, of being oneself subject to a rule of mercy and vengeance, pre- cisely similar to that which exhibits in Petra, and elsewhere over the East, the abiding tokens of God's wrath upon unrighteousness and iniquity. I mean hereby, that if a Christian appeals to the evidence of prophecy, he should appeal to it with a personal sense how nearly it comes -home to his own case: without such a caution, prophecy is a dangerous CH. XX.] PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM. 303 weapon; it confounds and silences an adversary — it does not convince and render him better, A vic- tory so obtained, has gained nothing for the con- queror ; he has but fought his way to an intellectual conquest, and has only closed his own and his oppo- nent's eyes the more firmly to the moral truth, that tliey are both under the same condition of mercy and vengeance ; a condition, which is attested by the facts they have acknowledged, though it may fail to be seen, felt, and recognised, by themselves. There is, therefore, a real danger in the prophetic evidence of religious truth when it becomes popular. It is apt to be used to silence others, not to be thought upon with awe and sincerity at home. The mind is daz- zled and delighted with the grandeur of so honour** able a witness to the truth of the faith it professes. It makes the creed glorious ; it removes the stigma of credulity ; it takes away the principle of belief, and substitutes conviction. But the heartfelt yearn- ing after a judge of good and evil, a rewarder of good, a hater of evil, — the God who deals with his children as a merciful father, — this is not a necessary part of the conviction obtained from prophetic ful-» filment. Too often an apprehension of the power and majesty of God, a sense of mere power and might, as if of some earthly monarch, arises out of it, filling the mind with the thought of a wonderful and stupendous object; while the heart remains blind to the moral truth that most concerns it. In the fate of Edom, we have the vengeance of God upon rebellion without repentance : the rebel- lious people are swept from the face of the earth utterly. In the fate of Egypt, we have his dealings with gross vice and sin : Egypt is become the basest of kingdoms. In Babylon, his dealings with over- weening wealth and dominion : the glory of the Chaldees' excellency is departed ; it has become 904 A VISIT TO THE EAST. pools for the bittern. In the Philistines, his ven- geance upon the enemies of truth. In the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, his fatherly chastisement of liis rebellious children ; casting them down, and yet again and again shewing them the light of his countenance, whenever they repented and turned to him. In their dispersion into all lands, his judgment upon unbelief. In his dealings with the seven churches of Asia, an earnest of his great judgment day, which is to come upon the catholic Church, as well as upon all the kingdoms and na- tions of the earth. In short, wherever we find prophecies in Scripture, it is very much to be ob- served, that they are invariably connected with mercy and judgment. This is the one 'peculiarity of Scrip- ture prophecy. A physician may foretel the return of a quartan ague, or predict the crisis of a disease for a certain hour, the event verifying his words. An almanac pre- dicts an eclipse of the moon, or the return of a comet, after certain years, and the event verifies the predic- tion. Nothing is more common than to hear predic- tions every moment, of one kind or another, of the weather, the harvest, the news of the day. Some men of extensive acquaintance of mankind, will predict the progress and fate of institutions and societies ; others, still more deep sighted, will predict the progress and fate of kingdoms, governments, and people. Each person really lives in the past, and on the future. Life is either memory or prediction, or both ; and often the one, by the aid and means of the other. It is also worthy of remark, that no people of Adam's race have ever been known to exist without some method, whether real or delusive, of ascertain- ing the future. Even the existence of imposture is here in part a presumptive proof of reality. In the Highlands of Scotland, tliere are many current CH. XX.] PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM. 305 tales of the predictions of aged seers, gifted with second sight. Welsh bards again, and Arab san- Ums, have been thought prophets. Merlins and other sagacious soothsayers are, to this day, authorities amongst our own common people ; nor is it pos- sible to deny that, after a liberal allowance for im- posture, there remains a great body of facts literally foretold, that the event has literally corresponded with the terms of the prediction. The heathen oracles did really predict events ; and it is im- possible, without acknowledging a certain degree of prophetic power upon earth, to account for the fact, that the human race has, in all ages, clung to certain channels of discovering the future, and has likewise recognised the belief in a certain gift of fore-* sight, natural to man as one of a distinct order of living spirits, given to him and permitted to him by God, independent of the interference of other spi-* jrits that are not of his race^ in the moral affairs of •the world. Yet it is true, on the whole, that by the com- inon consent of mankind no debt of reverence is due from them to such prophetic powers, as they have ordinarily known. When Crcesus desired to test the prophetic gift of the professed oracles of Greece, he employed himself in a strange occupation at a certain hour, and then sent to inquire from them^ ^' what had been at that time the nature of his occupa^ tions." The answer of Delphi described them very accurately : and notwithstanding this does not seem to have inspired him with greater reverence for the oracle, than we should now feel for any speculator in the funds, who should successfully predict a rise in the money market. He was astonished at their accuracy, and admired it ; was satisfied that it was no imposture, and, on the whole, confessed the 4>racle to be a clever one. No man rc^veres an D D 2 306 A VISIT TO THE EAiT. > astronomer for predicting the coming of a comet ; but we do greatly respect the words of a solid and thoughtful frienc^ who foretells the doubtful issue of an eventful and involved negotiation, the end of which, as far as we see, lies in the hands of others. Again ; we greatly respect the prediction of pious and virtuous advisers, who forewarn us of the dis* astrous issue of libertine and extravagant excesses. The reason being, that we acknowle^e, by the re* ligious instincts of native piety, that the issue of all these things is part of God*s judgment and govern- ment over us, and we confess, that foresight is here the divine privilege, given to sober reflection and sound piety. The nearer, as in die case of the sainfei of old, men have diligently conformed their lives to please Ood, the deeper they have been permitted to see into his moral government. After a certain point this power of foreknowledge ceases ; what is beyond is prophecy and revelation ; it being, as was before said, the one exclusive characteristic of Scriptinre prophecy, that it is ever connected eidier with Uod'» rewsu'ds or his punishments, — it ever speaks either of biasings or vengeance, of mercy or judgment^ redemption or condemnation, life or death. We have not a single prediction of a mere fact, simply as a fact ; if it be a fact that is foretold, — as that of the sun going back ten degrees for Hezekiah's sake, or the blindness of Zechariah — the prediction is part of a promise, and its fulfilment then becomes a sign and pledge of the truth, that the promise shall be likewise fulfilled. It must be also remembered,, that no pious Israelite ever dreamed of intellect* ually proving his religion to any of the people of the nations, by appealing to the truth of the pro- phets of his country. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, raised no arguments from prophecy be- fore Nebuchadnezzar ; but upon being commanded CU. XX.] PROPHECIES RELATING TO EDOM. 307 to fall down and worship the golden image which he had set up, they answered tiie king, *' The God whom we serve is ahle to deliver us out of thine hands, O king ; hut if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up" (Dan. iii, 17, 18). The argument from prophecy, then, as an argu- ment, as a theological weapon,*— however legitimate it may be in the hands of a divine, — is liable to sad misuse and perversion, in the private Chrisi> tian. Testimonies of the truth of prophecy are practical helps and assistances to faith; we have an internal disability and disinclination, arising from our sins, towards a hearty conviction of the great moral scheme of God's rewards and vengeances^ as really belonging to ourselves, part of our bap- tismal inheritance. The intellect toils and labours, to grasp and digest the fuU ai^mentative force of prophetic evidence ; but the heart alone can cherish the happy and yet solemn conviction, the cheering and yet soul-subduing consciousness, of per- sonal reality in the truths which it discloses. This is a consciousness which will be found, like the spring herbage of the desert, to die away in the common atmosphere of every-day life. I am hardly able to picture to myself an image fit to stand as emblem of the wanton trifling with prophetic truth, now pre- vailing, since it has become a favourite subject of popular reading. There were Greek soldiers in the rebellion, who, raw from the Morea, could with dif- ficulty be restrained from running s&er the Turkish bombs as they fell near their encampment. True, they little knew the deadly contents of the objects of their wild curiosity I But how little does the idle conversationalist, to whom these scenes are a mere passing object of wonder, from whom they extract a 308) A VISIT TO TH£ EAST. chance note of admiration, or whom they satisfy as a ready triumphal appea], or serve as a momentary check upon secret misgivings, really enjoy the ful- ness of the Divine Mercy, who has provided for our weak and wavering faith, our sickly and ailing love of him, so deep and daily increasing an insight into his fatherly dealings with his children! Prophecy is personally our witness, that God enters as a Father into the thoughts of our hearts : he foretold his vengeance upon certain sins, he has lifted up his almighty arm upon ^hose sins, he has swept away people for their sins. We know this ; we see it^ we speak ahout it; converse, talk, sift, pry, exa- mine, dehate, dispute ahout it; and continue to sin! Such is our privilege^ such our unhappy and mis- guided use of it. CHAPTER XXL FBTRA — A FAREWELL. It is the common opinion of those who have yisited Petra, that the rock excavations in it are tombs. And when it is asked by others who feel the difficulty of such a supposition, — If these be tombs, where, then, were the habitations of the immense number of people whose tombs they are? for a man must first live somewhere, before be can be buried ; — it is said in reply, that only one generation of men can be alive at once, but that each generation may, if such should be its pleasure, construct its own series of sepulchral dwellings; and that there is every other reason to suppose, diat the excava- tions in the rocks of Petra have been the continued labour of many generations. For my own part, I am very willing to acknowledge Petra as the me- tropolis of the dead. There is something solemn and pleasing in the idea, suited to its hidden and inac- cessible position ; and yet if these be resting places of none but the dead, how are we to understand the express terms of the prophet's message to this city ? *' O thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, though thou makest thy nest with the eagle, yet shalt thou be brought low." Again, who would not gladly picture to himself her rock galleries and pathways, her winding precipitous passages, her labyrinths of hewn thoroughfares, sounding with the full activity of life, and covered with a busy and animated popu- lation ? Surely it does not injure the solemnity of 310 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the scene, to view these solitudes, if but in fancy, as when they rang with the merry harp and the lute, and when these rock dwellings, if dwellings they were, poured forth their people, to welcome the con- querors home from their wars with Israel. Petra is still a vast sepulchral scene. Death is still supreme, notwithstanding the short merriment and gaiety of life, that has been suffered in his presence. Can we not, then, believe these rock excavations to have been the abodes of the living, and that the children of Esau did really dwell in them? — ^Let us see. Pagan records are almost silent respecting them. As rivals and enemies of Israel, both their birth and career belong exclusively to the Scripture; and certainly, for any thing to the contrary, contained in the inspired volume, we are free to imagine their way of life to have been in entire harmony with the solid character of these supposed habitations. They were a warlike people, for they refused Israel a pas-> sage through tlieir land: they were not unused to traffic, for they possessed a king's high road through their fastnesses. They were from the beginning a pastoral people ; for Esau accepted a pastoral pre- sent from his brother, at first declining it from a sense of the abundance he already had. As time advanced, they acquired wealth and merchandise ; for in the reign of Ahaz, they seized Elath, the Jewish station of East Indian commerce on the Red Sea. I'hey are said by historians to have made great pro- gress in the arts of life, and to have been celebrated for their proficiency in astronomy and other branches of knowledge. How far they may have borrowed the rudiments of these from Egypt, as being con<« nected, by position, with the land traffic which that country held with the Arabian coast, it is not easy to say. There are strong features in their architec-i iure of a spirit of design kindred in origin with that CH. XXI.] PETBA — 'A FARCWELt. 311 of Egypt. The works of both countries evince a kindred source, however they may differ in feature and execution. They are no travestie the one of the other, as the modem Doric colonnade (if even this can be supposed,) is of the ancient Doric order. They are the freeborn offspring of an independent genius, taking a different line, but starting from the same point; and perchance the learning and science of Edom was of the same stamp, the growth and crea* ture of the people themselves. Now the rock dwell- ings still remain as testimonies of the people, be they who they may, who made them ; but of tbeir science there are no remains, as the prophet has said (Obadiah 8), the wise men out of Edom are de- stroyed, and understanding perished out of the mount of Esau* Still, western people, who have lived and grown up under so different an order of national life, find that, afler all, they cannot reconcile themselves to the notion of an immense tract of perforated pre- cipices inhabited by men; and rather than entertain so repulsive a theory, they choose the more accept- able alternative, of supposing a series of more com- fortable dwellings in the valleys and open spaces, which they then mercilessly give over into the all- destroying hands of time, in order to account for the fact of there being now no surviving remains of them to be found. A delightful hypothesis, marked with so much kind consideration for the comforts of the departed people, that it seems almost hard hearted to refuse it credence. However, for my own part, I must decline to be- lieve it ; for though me can imagine none but rock- pigeons living in rocks, this is no more than a defect in western knowledge ; it is no difficulty at all in the East; there, to this day, the rock dwelling is a familiar part of the domestic economy of the people.. In the SIZ A YISIT TO TUB EAST. village of Siloam, near Jerusalem, the greater part of the inhabitants live in rooms cut out of the rock. In the wilderness of Engaddi there are numerous caves, which local tradition relates to have been the abode of hermits; indeed, St. Jerome himself spent some part of his life in this kind of solitude. The early monks, who chose these retreats, did not themselves make them ; a race of whom we know nothing, made and doubtless dwelt in them. The so called cave of Jeremiah, near the Damascus gate of Jerusalem, is now partly a dwelling place. Again, the caves in the rocks of Upper Egypt and Nubia were in St^ Anthony's time favourite retreats of the Egyptian monks, and yet they did not make them. Mr. Hope, a well-known traveller and architect, is of opi- nion, that the excavated temple, as found in Egypt and parts of Asia, was the first original form of tem- ple that the human race has possessed, and anterior to any edifice; the first attempts at which, when they began to be made, were in imitation of the ex- cavated form. If so, why may not a rock dwelling have preceded any attempt on the part of man to build himself a house, notwithstanding that the Ro- man poet forgets to enumerate this, as one of the stages of civilisation through which he considered mankind to have passed. If, then, the question were to rest here, there would surely be sufficient proof firom existing facts, to render the notion of a rock dwelling, to say the least, not incredible; but we are not left in any doubt at all about the matter, as I hope the sequel will shew. We have in the holy Scripture a substance of history coeval with this world, and in its several divisions and component parts, with the exception of the first book, contemporary with the times of which it treats. Almighty God appears to have CH. XXI.] PETRA A FAREWELL. 313 designed his revelation to rise as it were out of the current movements of his creatures. It has come to us in fragments, piece by piece, from time to time, seldom anything outwardly wonderful attending the production of its several parts ; and now that we possess them as a whole, we find them to be a book not unlike other books, varied in its contents and details, and such as many may handle, without dis- cerning the finger of God that has written it. Con- sistent with the design, that the birth of the holy Scriptures , should be marked by few circumstances outwardly different from the usual course of God's providence, is the tenour of their teaching; they make plain the dark sayings, and the divine truths, of the kingdom of heaven, by words and images in familiar use, taken from the current course of life, such as life was substantially at. the time when the several books were written. It was the merciful purpose of God, to take us again to himself; and he has been pleased to adopt our ways and thoughts, and to sanctify them, as the channels of his gracious message from heaven. The language of heaven would have been unintelligible to us, and it is therefore out of mercy, that our heavenly Father has veiled his glory, under emblems and images so familiar as to meet our infirmity. Now we find the metaphor of the rock dwelling, to be so marked a feature in the Scripture language, as to set the question at rest, that this species of habitation jnust, for ages and generations, have been quite familiar to the people of the East. To take an instance : our own life is commonly represented under the simili- tude of a tent or tabernacle, while. God's sure mercies are said to be *' as a dwelling in a rock." Or, again, where the Psalmist says, " Be thou to me for a rock of habitation^ whereunto I may continually resort" (Ps, xxxi. 2). - E E 314 A VISIT TO THE EAST. But to enter a little more into detail ; the holy Scripture, as a Divine gift to the whole universe of God's creatures, is not only a veiled message of salvation to individual men, into whose hands it may fall, but it is a body of current records, ex- hibiting the religious and political relationship of the Church of Israel to the surrounding people, shewing how ** the tabernacles of the Edomites and the Ishmaelites ; the Moabites and Hagarenes ; Ge- bal, and Ammon, and Amalek ; the Philistines, and they that dwell at Tyre," said, " Come let us root them out, that they be no more a people, and that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance :" and, ** how they cast their heads together with one consent and were confederate against them" (Psalm Ixxxiii.). If, therefore, the rock dwelling be one of the primeval forms of man's habitation, we are to expect that distinct allusions to this species of dwelling would be scattered over every part of such documents as these, and such accordingly are found there. In the early wars with the people of Canaan, the Israelites were frequently driven to take shelter in the rocks, where they dwelt and defended them- selves for some time. The tribe of Benjamin on their defeat entrenched themselves in the rock Rim- mon, near the Dead Sea. Samson, again, appears to have occupied the rock Etam, and to have dwelt there. King David in his wanderings more than once took refuge in the rocks, as in that of Maon, and in the wilderness of Engaddi. And, to turn from these isolated instances, to other incidental in- dications, that the notion of a rock dwelling was one then generally familiar, we may cite such passages as the following : " What hast thou here, and whom hast thou here, that thou hast hewed thee out a se- pulchre, as he that heweth him out a sepulchre on CH. XXT.] PETRA A FAREWELL. 315 high, and graveth a habitation for himself in a rock ?" (Isaiah xxii. 16.) In another passage the inhabi- tants of the rock are bid to sing with the wilderness and its cities. Again, at the great day of judgment, *' The loftiness of man shall be bowed dowij, and they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord. In that day shall a n^n cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, to go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the Lord and for the glory of his majesty, when he arise th to shake terribly the earth." " O ye that dwell in Moab, leave the cities and dwell in the rock" (Jer. xlviii. 28). From the book of Job it appears that the rock dwelling was quite familiar to that patriarch : " But now," he complains, " they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock ; yea, they were driven forth from among men to dwell in the cliffs of the valleys, in the caves of the earth, and in the rocks." From these and similar passages, it would ap- pear that the idea of rock dwellings was one familiar to those, times. It prevails, as we have seen, in the Scripture, and is so interwoven into the genius of its imagery, as almost to become a specisd feature in its language. \Vith this view of the case, then, it is difficult to refuse assent to the literal meaning of the words of the prophet ; but if a strong proof be still needed, a very remarkable one is afforded in another passage of the Scripture. The wilder- ness of Engaddi, and the whole range of rocks bordering upon the western bank of the Dead Sea, are remarkably like the rocks of Petra, and abound in excavations of a similar but a much ruder form. . This tract of country was known to have been in former days the settlement of the people of the 316 A VISIT TO THE EAST. Keiiites, respecting whom the prophecy of Balaam speaks as follows : — " He looked upon the Kenites, and took up his parable and said, Strong is thy dwelling place, and thou puttest thy nest in a rock. Nevertheless, the Kenite shall be wasted, until As- shur shall carry thee away captive.'* Now the two people, whose countries to this day exhibit the strongest vestiges of these supposed rock dwell- ings, are precisely those people who are addressed by the inspired prophets, the one as putting his nest in the rock, the other as dwelling within its clefts. It may be almost superfluous to add, that St. Jerome, the catholic father of Bethlehem, who had himself travelled in this country, in a work which treats geo- graphically of the cities of Palestine, after stating the boundaries of the territory of Edom, goes on to say, ** This is the land that was the possession of Esau ; they had their simple dwellings (Jiahitatiunculas) in the caves of the rock." After all, the domestic interior of the Edomite rock house is no greater stumbling block to a Euro- pean apprehension, than the wigwam of a red Indian. Indeed antecedently, our narratives of Esquimaux habits — of their canoes, their living in covered pits, their eating raw fish oil — are far more incredible, than that a warlike nation, such as Edom, should be found dwelling, as the prophetic phrase is, in the clefts of the rock. I see, therefore, no reason to doubt the plain literal fact, so unconsciously attested as this seems to be, that the rock chambers of Petra were real dwell- ing places, and that the dead and the living rested together side by side, a house, a tomb, and a temple, intermingled, according to the taste or caprice of the people. And if there be a difficulty in the way of a belief in this unusual union of life and death, it is nothing more than an expression of eastern judg- . ment in this matter, at variance with the tone of n CH. XXI.] PETRA — A FAREWELL. 317 western thought. The Egyptian families preserved the lifeless forms of their parents and friends, as an ordinary part of their household ; the early Chris- tians assembled to pray over their cemeteries; the Mahometan females meet in white dresses, to mourn and pray over the tombs of their relatives. In the minds of the people of the East death" has nothing repulsive connected with it. They have rather deemed it a release from the miseries of life, than looked upon it with horror, as a banishment from pleasures and gaieties. The tomb in the East is a sacred earnest of a happier life, and not the repul- sive memorial of a debt they shrink from. (Alas that it ever should so be !) Therefore to the inha- bitant of Edom, there could be no inconsistency in thus intermingling house, tomb, and temple. I should be inclined to believe, that as the true seed of Esau came to be supplanted by the mixed race, known in history as Nabathaeans, the manners of the people changed, and that such luxuries as Roman theatres, together with* the few houses whose ruins are scattered here and there in the valley, were then introduced. Houses, and Corinthian designs, have nothing Edomite about them. They are the genuine offspring of those many inventions, which have been sought out in civilised times. Perhaps what has been said may serve to ex- plain the circumstance, that while the traveller in Egypt is plagued to death with children pestering him to purchase fragments of Pharaonic antiquity, in such abundance that a piastre will buy all but a basket full, — in Petra, the Arabs, in no degree less greedy of money than the Egyptians, have never yet offered to a European any fragment of the private life of its people. This fact alone points to the solu- tion, given in the above account of the people, as a warrior tribe, dwelling in rocks, and for many gene- £ E 2 318 A VISIT TO THE EAST. rations destitute of such possessions as usually sur- vive, to fall into the hands of the antiquary. Not a single specimen, in any degree illustrative of the private life of the former inhahitants, was collected, or could be heard of or seen ; great quantities of broken pots, and some pieces of white marble only excepted. Indeed, I hardly know whether this is not the most wonderful of all testimonies to the literal truth of God*s prophecy. It is truly a desolation, and they are indeed perished from off the face of the earth, when not even a coin remains to tell a tale of them. Their works upon the face of the rock, and the volume of Scripture, are all that speak of ancient Edom. CHAPTER XXIL FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. When the morning came, it found me very sorry to go away. There is the sadness of exile, in the last act of quitting places of solemn grandeur, which even the prospect of an immediate return home is insufficient to obliterate. But whoever joins a large party must be prepared, either to conform, or to accept the alternative of inevitable ostracism. Submitting therefore to our fate, on Friday, 3d April, the camels were packed, and we started in a north westerly direction. We had approached Petra from the west. Our present route lay for some hours through the lower range of hills, which lie between the £1 Ghor and the mountains of Petra, winding through various little wadis and water-courses. Our unhappy table, that had been packed carelessly on the top of the luggage, to our great discomfort had one of its legs broken off, in the narrow defile through which we passed about noon, previous to entering upon the long sandy open plain of £1 Ghor. This El Ghor is a continuation of the long plain of the El Arabah, and extends to the Dead Sea. On coming into the plain, the sheick collected all the camels together ; and forming us into a compact body, with the few armed guides, which, for military form's sake, escorted us tli rough this perilous region, began to push forward at a good earnest pace, exceed- ingly different from the apathetic straggling rate at which we had travelled to Petra. They seemed 320 A VISIT TO THE EAST. to consider it not impossible, that we might be surprised by a party of the Kerek Arabs, or some other of the tribes that occupy the banks of the Dead Sea to the east, whose character for daring rob- beries stands very high, and who are said to possess horses, a species of wealth to which the Alewins are strangers. We had no objection to the steady business-like pace at which we were crossing the plain in a W.N.W. direction ; and were in fact,' on this and the following day, very grateful to the martial character of the neighbouring tribes, for procuring it for us. I know nodiing else, tliat could have main- tained such progressive unanimity amongst us, for so long a time. We came in the evening to an en- campment, where were a few palm-trees, and a foun- tain of salt brackish water. The following morning our route took a more northerly direction, and con- tained but little that was interesting. We passed on the right hand side of the track a heap of stones^ lying about in confusion on the side of a little hil- lock, which, our guides informed us, mark the spot where a great engagement had once taken place be- tween the neighbouring tribes. We had seen, the day before, the little stone altars which the Be- douins raise, on coming in sight of Mount Hor and Aaron's tomb; but our route was possibly not the same as Professor Schubert's, for I remember no- thing of the large stone which his attendants, and all his friends, helped to roll further up the hill on which they found it; and respecting which he re- lates the Bedouin tradition : " That when this stone shall have reached the Red Sea, tlien will be the day of judgment, and the end of the world." They are firmly persuaded that each year this stone moves forward about an arm's length, and that of late years it has moved forward much more rapidly. One of the older camel-drivers affirmed it to have been CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. S2l some years ago on the top of a hillock at some dis- tance. It is worth observing, as shewing the affinity of popular legendary belief, that there is in Cheshire a similar traditionary prophecy, that whenever a line of hills to the north of Chester shall remove across the river Mersey, then will be the end of the world ; and it is curious that for some years a quarry has been very actively worked there, and the stone taken to Liverpool, across the river. Towards evening our march became much more interesting : we crossed and recrossed several little wadis, and saw a good deal of brushwood and tufts of pale grass. At last we came to a very pretty encampment, at the foot of the great chalkstone range that bounds the territory of Judea to the south, in one of the wadis tributary to El Ghor, of the name of which our Bedouins seemed to know nothing. We were now in the neighbourhood of many great Scripture events. According to exist- ing Arab tradition, we were near to the mount where Hagar is said to have received, at the hands of the angel, the assurance of the covenant, now fulfilled in the spread of the Mahometan faith (Gen. xvi. 10): "I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude. Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear as on, and shalt call his name Ishmael ; because the Lord hath heard thy affliction. And he will be a wild man ; and his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him ; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.*' It was here that the army awaited the return of the twelve chosen men sent to spy out the land, when all but Caleb brought an evil report respecting the giants, the sons of Anak. The following morning, an hour's march brought us to the foot of the Assaphah, as the Bedouins named the pass, and a slippery ascent it proved, last- 32ft A VISIT TO THE EAST. ing almost two hours. The view over the desert is fine and very peculiar, possessing the somewhat especial charm of being a farewell to sand and steri- lity. We were evidently about to enter upon symp- toms of an approach to cultivated land. We be- gan to observe remains of walls dividing the land into fields and enclosures, as if at some former time inhabited ; on the right was a Roman fort, and in the valley, the remains of an artificial re- servoir for water ; also at different intervals the foundations of stone buildings, and other indications of a station or town formerly existing here. In a little while the extensive view over the desert was lost ; and after descending by a rough rocky path, we came into a long and comparatively fertile valley, where the semi Bedouin tribes, who live near Ghaza, come to feed their flocks at certain times of the year. We encamped at four o'clock, afler a delightful day's march. The scene is now changed to green valleys, with good pasturage, flocks of sheep and goats, tents of Arabs, whose dark grey, low, circular encampments reminded us of Druidical remains on the Welch hills. There were other indications also of our being on the verge of civilised life, as it might be upon the very boundary line, for savage and cultivated life mutually disputed the territory. At one time we passed by a well, where a civil-looking shepherd was drawing water for his sheep, assembled round a long trough ; and again, a little further on, had a sick camel fallen down, over whom vultures and hawks, and numerous other scavenger satellites of the desert, (among them several white birds with red bills, not unlike sea-gulls) were flying in great eagerness to begin their repast. The poor beast was expending its remaining strength in bidding defiance with its long neck to its persecutors, and seemed in great CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. 323 misery from a consciousness of being about to be devoured. We passed in the morning an Arab tomb, with a dome built of stone, in good taste, but partly in ruins ; close to it is the usual stone en- closure containing a well. We also passed two large handsomely made wells, of good masonry, contain- ing excellent water ; near to them were many foun- dations of stone houses, indicating the existence of some great town in past times. The transition from sand to cultivation is so little violent, that a person is at a loss to know when he has absolutely left the desert. The Arabs in the encampments were also a step nearer to civilisation; for though hardly better than our own attendants in personal ap- pearance, they have no need to tear up roots and wild plants for their subsistence ; and though they bear but an indifferent character for honesty, they were very civil to us, in allowing us to buy se- veral dairy productions, such as cheese and butter. Butter -milk and curds were offered without pay- ment, and when a few piastres were in return be- stowed upon the children, the mothers appeared to be quite content. There had been a rencontre between a village chief of these people and some of the pacha's irregular cavalry ; and Scheik Sa- lem, having made inquiries respecting it, judged it prudent that we should take a more circuitous route to the right. We were now come into the re- gions of green grass ; and no sooner had we as- cended a tolerably steep hill, than it began to rain : it was therefore deemed advisable to come to a halt as soon as possible. We accordingly pitched on the side of the hill, on wet grass, and prepared to en- counter a wet night, — an expectation but too amply realised. Tuesday, 7th April, it rained and blew the whole night. At one time the tent was in imminent dan- 3^4 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ger of being blown entirely over, the cords giving way ; but fortunately I awoke in time to hold it up until the pegs could be once more secured. In the morning the rain still continued ; but it was judged better to proceed. We were about four hours dis- tant from Hebron, and about one hour from the usual track. Happily we had not proceeded far when the rain subsided into occasional showers. At the junction of the two paths, we passed the ruins of a large church, or tower, but had not time to examine it. Here the peculiar features of Palestine begin to appear: the hills cut into terraces, . the wheat springing up in patches, wherever a little level ground permits its cultivation ; and yet on the whole the country* has the appearance of being greatly overgrown with rubbish and brushwood. As we ap- proached Hebron, the sight of olive-trees and vine- yard grounds, surrounded by ruinous loose stone .walls, with their watch-towers, in which the fruit is guarded by the cultivators in the vintage season, be^ came an indubitable proof of a still nearer advance to cultivation. We were now proceeding up the val- ley of Eschol, which to this day has a great celebrity for its grapes, when the town of Hebron burst upon us, with its substantial grey walls and mosque, em- bosomed in vineyards and olive gardens, and occupy- ing the hollow of a very rich fertile valley. An eastern adventurer has long since accustomed himself to find that the outside promises far more than the inside fulfils ; and yet I confess we were surprised at the unusually narrow, crooked, and filthy streets of Hebron, almost worse for affecting to be paved : for some time we wandered about them, until at last stumbling on the Scheik £1 Belled, or chief citizen of the town, upon whom the duty of enter- taining strangers falls, we were assigned a lodging in the house of a very civil Arab, with a white beard. {' CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. 3^5 whose family vacated in our favour a room full of holes instead of windows, in which, nevertheless, we were soon very comfortable, when the carpets were spread, and all our possessions disposed in due order. Our host and all his family, with their sleek well-fed faces, were a great contrast to our late bronzed sun-dried attendants. We were glad to be able to spend a comfort- able night once more in a house, although I have since often regretted my tent. When the morning came, we put ourselves under the guidance of an old Jew, who offered his services as cicerone, with the intention of visiting the town, it being decided that we should not remain long in it. He took us at once to tfa^ mosque, which contains what is said to be the tomb of Abraham. We were not of course allowed to enter it ; but an open door in the side permitted us to see the building that is called the tomb, and which is said to be erected over the cave of Macpelah, where Abraham and Sarah were buried. It seemed a small circular building, sur- mounted by the dome common to the Mahometan mausoleum, and it is gready venerated by all Arabs and Musulmen. At the south entrance of the town is a large, handsome, and well-built tank for water, of excellent masonry, and in good repair. It is called David's pool ; nor is there the least reason to doubt that it was constructed by that monarch. There are steps at one of the comers leading down to the water, which at the time happened to be covered with a thick green sedge. Not far from it is the tomb of Abner, a plain mortar-built structure, into which we descended by several steps, and found a large solid sarcophagus imbedded in the wall, bear- ing every mark of the most remote antiquity. There is, in fact, no reason to doubt the genuineness of the tradition. In it, besides the body of Abner, SauFs F F 326 A VISIT TO THE EAST. captain, was buried the head of Ishbosheth, Saul's son and successor on the throne, who afler a short reign of two years was murdered, and his head brought by his murderers to David. David caused it to be buried in the tomb of Abner, who had been the faithful servant of Saul, and hanged the mur- derers over the pool we had just visited, as he had previously put to death the Amalekite who boasted with his own hand to have slain Saul. We were now taken outside the town, up a rough, crooked pathway, leading from the western gate, through broken enclosures, wherein were some olive-trees and other symptoms of gardening, to see the supposed house of Jesse, the father of David, with the wells belonging to it. Here, ac- cording to the legend, David, as a stripling tend- ing his father's sheep, was called by Samuel the prophet, and anointed, in the room of Saul, to be king over Israel. The remains of the house are of good stone ; and it would be a sceptical dealing with an old tradition to refuse some kind of credence to the story, especially since it is the belief of the re- sident Jews of Hebron, who can have no possible motives of interest in sustaining the tradition. The locality may be tlie same, whatever is said respect- ing the building; and I have a pleasure in being able to believe that this is the scene of David's early ca- reer before he became king over the whole of Israel. Our time was limited, or we should have visited the remaining spots that usually attract the notice of pilgrims — the site of David's palace, the tomb of the prophet Nathan, the house and garden of Abra- ham ; but it became necessary to return, to super- intend the packing up of our litde remaining property, it having been decided that we should proceed to Bethlehem. The majority of the inhabitants of Hebron are CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. 327 either Mahometans or Jews; the Jews chiefly of the Spanish tribe, although the old man who shewed us round the town and its buildings came from Ger- many, and had been settled twenty years in Hebron. His countrymen, true to their ancient character, are by far the most industrious part of the population ; and, in spite of the filth and slovenliness of their out- ward appearance, there is a remnant in their coun- tenances of something like that superiority, which even yet makes a visible distinction between the ancient Israelite and the nations. In fact, both here and in Cairo, and wherever else there is a colony of these people in the East, there are traces of a cast of countenance, wherein are symptoms of something far more noble than can be found in the features which we call classic. The ordinary English idea of a Jew, if resolved into its elements, would be found to com- prise so little besides the exorbitant pedlar, the vendor of spectacles, and the old clothesman with his broken hat, faded brown cloak, and grey grisly beard, that no wonder if a notion of the extreme beauty of Jewish features is entertained with diffi- culty. But the more the traveller advances eastward, the more he finds the features of this wonderful people returning to their native stamp. In Poland they are fenced up in distinct villages ; and although their habits of life are to a certain extent European, their own legal observances are far more stringent than in either France, Germany, Italy, or England ; consequently it is observed that the countenances of the Jews in Poland have far more of the Jewish feature than in many of the more polished lands of Europe ; and the nearer they are found to the home of their forefathers, the more does their peculiar national physiognomy declare itself. In Cairo and in tliis town, the return to an Eastern dress is much in their favour ; and venerable in every way as is the Maho- StS A VISIT TO THE EAST. metan, with his long silvery heard and grave dignity of demeanour, tliere are remains of a peculiarity in the features of Eastern Jews even yet, that hear invo- luntary testimony to the nohility and former glories of their race, when they were the favoured people of God. Near to our host's house were the families of several Jews, the extreme heauty of whose child- ren it was impossible not to notice. It must, however, be confessed, that if there are elements of great- ness in the Jewish physiognomy, nothing could less remind us of it, than the general appearance of our guide, or of the young wine-merchant who brought us several samples of some very tolerable wine, and who would gladly have persuaded us to purchase a supply for the whole of the time we proposed to re- main in Syria. It belongs to marked features to exhibit degradation. A tame^ spiritless race, such as the Armenian, may maintain for generations the same uniform, sleek, inanimate Boeotian face; but in so wonderful a people as the Jews, the national features must be either objects of admiration or dis- gust; — they have either the stamp of their birth- right nobility, or the brand of their acquired debase- ment. Hebron is certainly a very pretty town, and in the time of its prosperity must have been a* lovely retreat : its olive-yards, vine-yards, terraces, rich green meadow grass, water-courses bubbling down the sides of the hills, and the rich fat soil of the valley ; the undulating form of the hills in which it is hidden, its freshness, life, beauty, and greenness, — all conspire to put the wayfarer in excellent spi- rits, after having escaped from the dry, colourless, wan, sandy dust of the desert. Still the charm had its reverse when we came to find a troop of sleek rogues and mendicants, waiting for the cavalcade to depart. The Bedouins never begged, nor did they CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. 829 display their sores, nor raise lamentations, tuned by long practice to the truest notes of powerful mendi- cant effect ; they had no idle, gaping, staring curi- osity, as if we were a fresh order of beings sent upon earth, and only to remain a short time. Each morning on the desert as we left the encampment, they attended to their business, and shewed us all deference and civility, which we were too happy to return. But now, children and women, janissaries, sheicks, and sheicks' servants, all congregated round the Franks, their harpy eyes gleaming with anti- cipations of " bachshish;** and their countenances alternating between vacant stares of wide-mouthed wonder, and eager watching for any symptom of a present about to be bestowed. This reminds me that we had rather a curious scene in paying Sheick Salem the remainder of his money. I had noticed during the march that it was only for the first day after leaving Petra that our fifteen valiant guards were really present, and even then it is a ques- tion whether, in the event of an attack, our dan- ger would not have been much greater with them than without them. Still each guard was to re- ceive, according to their bargain, 260 piastres ; and this sum we now disputed with Sheick Salem and the wily old Yomgebel Abouseeton. After many reasons urged by them, they could at last say no- thing, and were about to depart, considering that they were wasting their words, of which no Arab is at any time, but especially in a matter of payment, very economical. It was not our object, however, to keep back the money ; but simply to see whether they could be brought to a sense of the injustice of their demand, and perhaps to vindicate ourselves as not totally blind dupes of an imposition, to which at Akaba there was no other alternative but submission. F F 2 330 A VISIT TO THE EAST. They were therefore paid and dismissed, afcer a due ceremony of appropriate salaams. In setting out from Hebron by the usual path, we pass at no great distance from an aged oak, known by the name of Abraham's Oak. Our ser- vant happened to be lingering behind, and we made several attempts to explain to the Mukkaro, that we wished the camels to be led past the oak ; but in vain — the man would not understand ; and when the servant afterwards overtook us, we had passed the spot too far to return. I have since greatly regretted it : for this oak must be one of the few remaining large trees of Judea ; but whether it is quite of the age which tradition assigns to it, is somewhat uncertain. The difficulty consists in believing in the durability of any tree through so many centuries. The age of this tree, however, unquestionably far exceeds that of any of the well-known oaks of the West, and must always be a venerable object, as still pos- sessing its vegetable life, after so many generations fAepdwfay avdpunwv have appeared and laid down theirs around it. The ride to Bethlehem, which is about ten or twelve miles distant from Hebron, was exceedingly interesting, although we were compelled to content ourselves with donkeys, whose rough ambling pace, with the huge uncouth mass of stuffed sacking strapped on their backs for a saddle, allowed the rider little leisure for much silent meditation. One of our companions narrowly escaped with his life from a severe accident. He had found the donkey that was brought to him too little, being a very tall man, and chose in preference to ride upon the top of a baggage camel. The road is rough and hilly, and the driver had carelessly neglected to girth the camel's saddle. As the animal, therefore, was ex- CH. XXII.] FROM FETRA TO JERUSALEM. 331 erting itself to climb up a part of the path which is very stony and steep, our friend found it necessary to cling firmly to the saddle, to save himself from falling backwards. This measure of precaution had a disastrous result that he did not intend ; for the entire load of the camel, being packed without fastenings, the whole together with the rider was thrown backwards by the exertion used; and so severe was the fall, that for three weeks Dr. was unable to leave his bed, and was with great difficulty removed to Jerusalem. The ride took us over a country of undulating hills, whose otherwise stony and rather barren aspect is corrected and enli- vened by numerous olive-grounds, little patches of wheat, and a few vineyards ; but as to the road itself, it is a perfect libel upon the name, to call it a road : it is no more than the little covering of soil worn away by constant trampling from off the bare, jagged sur- face of the rock, which is the substance of all the hill country of Judea. We passed in the course of two hours by the pools, which are known as Solomon's pools. They are three large and well-built stone cisterns, one above the other, and connected with Jerusalem by an aqueduct, traces of which still subsist on the sides of the hills ; indeed, their size and solidity is calculated to give a high idea of the Hebrew works of that powerful monarch's reign. Close to them is an ugly square fort in ruins ; die work, as it is believed, of the Crusaders. It was nearly five o'clock before we came to Bethlehem ; its appearance, as we drew near, was that of a handsome town on an eminence, with a few remains of walls. The interior is exactly like that of Hebron, full of narrow, crooked, and dirty streets. We were received at the Latin convent with ex- treme kindness and hospitality, and remained there until the following day. I shall not now relate to you all that we nere shewn in the birthplace of the Redeemer ; there ia a mingled feeling of respect and regret in witnessing its present condition. My own feelings nould lead me to be wary and tender in Bpeaking of the abuses that may be here discern- ible ; and yet a second visit to these holy scenes renews every painfid thought, to which the existence of undoubted perversions of a true faith and practice cannot fail to give rise. We had despatched a messenger from Hebron to the Rev. J, Nicolayson, tlie Anglican missionary at Jerusalem, and had received a reply kindly of- fering to my companion and myself the use of an empty room in the mission preniises, vacant by the return of the physician, Dr. Gerstman, to England ; we were therefore at ease about our reception, which, but for Mr. Nicolayson's kindness, would have proved CH. XXII.] FROM PETRA TO JERUSALEM. SSS a matter of much difficulty, die Easter ceremonies being upon the point of commencing, and the whole town full of the pilgrims of all countries. The ride occupied an hour ; and apart from the associations of mind arising out of the ground we were traversing, there was nothing at all in the stony, barren, hilly, desolate-looking scenery to give pleasure to the eye. At length we came in sight of the " solitary city that was full of people, the widow of nations :" it was fii- miliar to me, and a second visit naturally loses the deep charm which belongs to the first ; to my com- panion, however, it was a very affecting sight. Al- though in point of outward beauty, Jerus^em from this approach appears nothing more than a long sweep of castellated walls of unequal height, owing to the undulating ground they traverse, guarded at frequent distances by towers, here and there a dome or minaret shooting up, still it is Jerusalem ; and though the entire effect is to provoke an involuntary sigh, '* can this be the queen of cities. Mount Zion, the fair city, the joy of the whole earth?" still the answer is, it is Jerusalem, On approaching nearer, the wide deep valley of Hinnom intervenes; and the walls then assume their native loftiness of position, as de- fending the steep rocks upon which they are built. Crossing the valley on a broad raised causeway that appeared to be a remnant of the ancient city, the path led for some distance close under the western walls ; and having passed the fine old building which bears the name of David's Tower, we entered the holy city through the Bethlehem gate, at which an idle sleepy listless company of soldiers was stationed, who asked no questions. And thus I found myself, after an interval of seven months, once again within the walls of the holy city. CHAPTER XXIII. THB WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES IN THE WILDERNESS OF SINAI. I FIND SO much sound piety and accurate research in a little pamphlet of Karl von Raumer s, entitled Zug der Israeliten aus JEgypten nach Canaan, that, hav- ing promised to return to this subject, I make no further apology for the following chapter, in which the substance of his remarks will be found. Jacob and his sons received from Pharaoh a dwelling place in the land of Goshen, or Hameses, as it is called (Gen. xlvii. 11). This land is said to have contained the cities of Pithom, Raamses, and On, or Heliopolis, where Joseph^s father in law, Poti- pherah, was priest. Heroopolis, the present Abou Katschab, distant about sixteen leagues north east of Heliopolis, appears to have been its boundary towards the desert. Northward of Heliopolis, near the Mokattam rocks, are found remains named Tel el Yahood, hills of the Jews, and Turbet el Yahood, tombs of the Jews. The land of Goshen may be therefore fairly fixed on the east bank of the Nile, below the present town of Cairo, bounded by the Nile and the wilderness ; nor is there any reason to believe that the Israelites had more than a mere permission to dwell here, separate from the Egyptians, to whom, as shepherds, they were an abomination. They were to dwell here in bondage until the iniquity of the Amorites should be full. When an- other Pharaoh rose up, who knew not Joseph, then CH. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 335 commenced the years of their servitude; which lasted until Moses returned to them from Mount Horeb, with God's commission to deliver them. How the people increased, notwithstanding their own servitude, and the cruel measures which Pha- raoh took to protect his kingdom from the exceed- ing growth of a population not belonging to him, is well known to each reader of Scripture. It was on the morning of the 15th day of the first month, Abib, after they had eaten on the night before of the passover lamb, and had sprinkled their door- posts and lintels with the blood, that the people journeyed from Rameses to Succoth — 600,000 men, besides children, and a mixed multitude with their flocks and herds, at Pharaoh's urgent command; '* for," said the Egyptians, afler witnessing the death of their first born, " we be all dead men." The end of their wandering was the promised land of Canaan. The nearest way thither would have been the usual caravan track to Gaza, the Philistine city, which is to this day the main route between Syria and Egypt. But " God led them not through the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near ; for God said. Lest peradventure the people repent when they see war, and they return to Egypt" (Ex. xiii. 17). And, moreover, God had commanded Mo- ses, " When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain" — viz. Horeb (Ex. iii. 1^). " Therefore God led the people about, through the way of the wilderness of the Red Sea" (Ex. xiii. 18). Instead, then, of taking the usual north-east track to Gaza, they turned to the south. From Cairo to Suez, on the right hand of the common track, is a low ridge of hills extending across the desert, the east end of which forms the Ras At- taka, a noble precipitous rock to the south of Suez. 336 A VISIT TO THE EAST. The west termination is Djebel Mokattam, upon which the citadel of Cairo is built. To the south of this range is found a broad, uneven valley, Wadi el Tih, t. e. the valley of wandering, ending at the Red Sea, close to the south of Ras Attaka. About thir- teen hours to the east of Bezatin, which is a little village on the banks of the Nile opposite the mouth of the Wadi el Tih, there is a track branching off to the left at the end of the Wadi Ghendely, that joins the usual caravan route to Suez. According to Niebuhr, the Israelites followed this path ; accord- ing to old tradition, Father Sicard, and others, they continued in the south-east track, passed Djebel Grai- bur on the right, through Wadi Ramlyeh and Wadi el Tawarik, to the open plain that lies between Ras Attaka and Ras Derah. On a comparison of the two routes, I think, with Von Raumer, there can be no reasonable doubt that the one described by Father Sicard, confirmed as it is by old tradition, is the true one, in preference to the supposition which modem travellers have adopted, that the Israelites crossed close to Suez. The genius of modem scepticism has secredy rejoiced to throw a suspicion of ambiguity upon this miracle ; it would rather that it should be uncertain how far the ordinary powers of nature may not have sufficed. For an entirely opposite reason, I rejoice to find the impossibility of any ambiguous character; for where the mind cannot be brought cheerfully to believe the Scripture, of the two it is perhaps better openly to accuse the book of fraud, than to attempt to reduce Almighty majesty and power to a meagre conformity with some rationalist hypothesis. Tradition still possesses many remembrances of Moses in the neighbourhood of Bezatin. A plot of ground near to it is still known as an ancient bury- ing place of the Jews ; an adjoining rock on the left CH. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 337 has still the name of Mejanat Mousa, station of Mo- ses ; some old ruins on the Tourah hills to the right, the Fellahs name Merawad Mousa, sorrow of Moses. The people then being forbidden to take the common caravan road to Gaza, advanced from their dwelling in Goshen, past Bezatin, and entered the Wadi el Tih, encamping the first day at Succoth. Professor Schubert travelled along this track as far as Ghendely, which Von Raumer believes to be the same with the first Israelite encampment, Succoth. His description occupies several pages, but is too enthusiastic and florid to be of much in- terest, were I to quote it ; it is, however, so far satis- factory, that the professor is decidedly in favour of the opinion, that this was the Israelite route. Beyond Ghendely in the plain of Ramlyeh, according to Sicard, is the second station, Etham. It was here that Moses was commanded to cause the people to turn, and encamp before Pihahiroth, in order that Pharaoh might say, *' They are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath shut them in," and that his heart might be hardened to " follow after them" (Exodus xiv. 3, 4) ; as considering that they had lost their way in the wilderness, and would be an easy prey. Wherever Etham may be, it is clear, from the com- mand here given to the people to turn, that they had now before them the option of taking the common road, and that for an express purpose they were com- manded to turn from it, and encamp before Pihahiroth, viz. that Pharaoh might be tempted to follow them. The Mosaic narrative omits the mention of any sta- tion between Etham and Pihahiroth, simply relating that Pharaoh overtook them encamping beside Piha- hiroth and before Baalzephon, and that the Israelites were sore afraid. They had no hope of any possi- bility of saving themselves by flight. The mountain Attaka on the lef^, and that of Djerah on the right, G G 338 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the remembrance of the defile they had passed through, together with the sea that lay immediately before them, made it clear that " they were now entangled in the land, that the wilderness had shut them in." In their fear, therefore, they cried unto Moses, and were told by him, ** Ye shall see the Egyptians no more ; the Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace." Professor Robinson has called this an untenable hypothesis. The distance being here not less than twelve miles across, he enters into calculations to shew how impossible it must have been for so lai^e a multitude, burdened with children, flocks and herds, to have effected the passage before the morn- ing watch. Admitting the correctness of all he has said, I would answer, that if it be possible to believe that the chariot wheels of the Egyptians were taken off, so that they drave heavily, there can be no dif- ficulty in believing that the multitude may have effected their passage within the time which he al- lows them. There seems, however, no sort of rea- son for his notion, that the Israelites had necessarily effected their passage, when the sea returned upon the Egyptians. The act of vengeance upon the wicked Egyptians was as much a part of the miracle as the deliverance of the chosen people ; and no sooner, therefore, was the Egyptian host fairly en- tered into the sea, than vengeance came upon them* (Exodus xiv. 28, 29): ** The waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh ; but the children of Israel walked (t. e, continued to walk) upon dry land in the midst of the sea, and the waters which destroyed their enemies were a wall unto them on their right hand and on their left." In correspondence with this account is the old Arab tradition, which has given the name of the Cn. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OP THE ISRAELITES. 339 fountains of Moses to the few springs which are directly opposite the Wadi Tawarik. Niebuhr is the first of this since tolerably nu- merous class of rationalist expounders of Scrip- ture, who has advocated the notion that Suez is the scene of this famous passage. To Niebuhr it is in- credible how the Egyptians could be so devoid of reason, as to follow the children of Israel through a passage where the waters were a wall on their right hand and on their left ; but then how incredible that after enduring ten plagues, it- should be the eleventh which frightened them into letting the people go ! A certain Danish traveller advances a step further, and says unreservedly, " Although the body of water to the north of Birket el Pharaoun be but small, I still hold it to have been much too broad and deep, for any possibility that Moses should have led the children of Israel through it ;" while it seems quite reasonable to him that they may have passed over the little tongue of water, across which the Arabs fre> quently wade at ebb tide. Exceedingly probable, cer- tainly, that as Moses sang, ** The people shall hear, and be afraid : sorrow shall take hold on the inha- bitants of Palestina. Then the dukes of Edom shall be amazed; the mighty men of Moab, trembling shall take hold upon them : all the inhabitants of Canaan shall melt away** (Exodus xv. 14, 15) — when all they were to hear was, that the Israelites had at ebb tide waded through water that was knee- deep ! Such is the violence, adds Von Raumer, in some remarks which I must be pardoned for quoting at length, that is done to the word of God, in order to bring down his workings from the miraculous and supernatural, within the sphere of common every- day life. And these unnatural expositions are then named natural explanations of what is supernatu- 340 A VISIT TO THE EAST. ral. Whence proceeds this distaste towards a real miracle ? Do they mean that such a belief may have been well enough for the preexisting childhood of the human race, but that it will not suit the ripeness of its intellectual manhood ? Is it not rather, that this nil admirari is a symptom of a darkened de- funct idiotcy ? lliese persons appear to me, as if they looked upon the world to be a sort of constitu- tional government, in which the law of nature is the constitution. But whether the almighty Creator of heaven and earth, of his free mercy, hath given this constitution, or whether the sovereign people of his creatures has had any share in its institution, they no where say. So much, however, is certain, that a strong protest and opposition is raised the moment it is said that God has done any thing whatever in the power of his own might, which is judged by these persons to be at variance with this constitution, or law of nature. They raise a cry of treason against the law of nature. The nexus rerumy they say, is in danger. These persons look full of deep thought, as if they really saw through this nexus rerum^ and knew ex- actly what was and what was not possible to God. Do they really know why water runs down hill ; why fire ascends ; how it is that a mighty oak rises from the acorn ; how bread nourishes them ; or how their heart beats day and night? Is there any answer that they can make to the least question respecting the creation, such as God himself would give ? Do they not know such answers to be impossible to man, while he is placed in this region of perplexity ? They cannot know themselves, nor the boundary, '* thus far, and no farther," which is placed to man's power of knowledge. Its proud waves would fain burst the mark God has set to them. In darkness and ignorance, they think to understand all that surrounds CH. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 341 them, and to know the reason why every thing is as it is ; all the while mistaking their familiarity with a certain ord^r of things, that continues the same throughout their lives, for a knowledge of the things themselves, and of the laws existing in them. Hence they conclude all that is not conformable to what they are accustomed to see, to be a deviation from the laws of existence. I hardly know whether I have conceded too much or too little, when I said that many believe in a God of nature only. We hear, certainly, of the grandiloquent terms in which they speak of the majesty of God, and how they cite texts of Scrip- ture to prove that " with God all things are possi- ble," " he can do all that he will," &c. Is not this, it may be asked, to confess the almighty power of God ? So it would seem ; but let these champions of almighty power be questioned, whether they con- fess his power in the individual instances. Here they deny it. They will not concede, as we have just seen, to the Creator of heaven and earth, whom they notwithstanding profess to be almighty, — no, not so much power as is needful to make the Is- raelites a way through the Red Sea. They will not believe in the reality of any thing miraculous, ex- cept so far as they can comprehend it ; or in other words, they take away all that is miraculous, by an explanation from natural causes, that is, they be- lieve in no miracle at all. They would, in the same way, deny that an oak could come from an acorn, were the fact not too plain for them. . We may there- fore apply to them the Lord's words addressed to the rationalist Sadducees : ** Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God." They make a pretence of believing that the al- mighty God is every where present. But should it be said to them, that the prayer of Moses (Exod. a G 2 342 A VISIT TO THE EAST. xiv. 15) was then, or that of a pious Christian is now heard, they ridicule the idea; and say that prayer may perhaps be good as a personal exercise, elevat- ing the individual, but that to believe in its efficacy is plain folly. Is our God, then, a dumb, unloving idol, who neither can or will hear ? How are we to account for such inconsistencies ? They indicate a widely extended deception of our own times, which has adopted the believing language of a better age, retains it in its mouth, but knows no- thing of it as a living principle in the heart. I must be pardoned this digression, which has been occasioned by observing these rationalist ex- planations of the passage of the Israelites. It may sound hard, but it is true. It is the plain atheism of disbelief in God, and in his moral and almighty go- vernment of the world, which alone has suggested such worthless explanations in this and other cases. In former times, the fool was content to say in his heart, ** there is no God," but now they proclaim it upon the house tops. Atheists that before were silent, have now taken courage, and are loud in their accla- mations in favour of those who give utterance to the sentiments of their own hearts. It has gone so far, that they feel themselves relieved from the trouble of inventing certain absurd explanations, with an in- tent, half polemic, half defensive, relieved by some- thing more dian an absurd, — an unholy, godless, utter denial. The Israelites now advanced from their first station, the Ayoun Mousa, or wells of Moses, three days' journey into the wilderness, and came to the fountain Marah, so called from its extreme bitter- ness. It is the same with the well Howara, distant about fifteen hours from the Ayoun Mousa ; and con- tinues to this day so bitter, as to be fit for the use of none but beasts. They encamped once by the CU. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 34S sea coast before coining to Elim ; from thence there is reason to suppose that they came into the Wadi Mokattab. Here they received the manna, *' white, like coriander-seed, and the taste thereof like wafers made with honey" (Ex. xvi. 31). Seetzen gives the following explanation : '* Manna is still collected by the Arabs ; and they call it Man. It drops from the tamarisk tree gene- rally in the months of June and July. Moses says he was aware beforehand of the time of its produc- tion, from having dwelt so many years in the land. He would know also, that since his people quitted Egypt immediately after Easter, it being now a month and a half since they came into the desert, within a few days it must make its appearance." Burckhardt confirms Seetzen's report, that manna still continues to drop from the tamarisk, but only in rainy seasons. The tree itself is found only in par- ticular districts of the peninsula — in Wadis Sheick and Nasseb. Riippel, in like manner, adds, that the tamarisk is found in but a few valleys ; mentioning, amongst others, the Wadi Feiran, which is a continu- ation of the Wadi Sheick of Burckhardt. Ehren- berg*s account of this modern manna is the most accurate. *^ Manna," says he, ** continues still to fall in the peninsula of Mount Sinai, though not from heaven, but from the tamarisk bush. (He names the plant the tamarix mannifera.) The tliin branches of the tamarisk are covered v/iih numerous insects, which perforate the bark in innumerable places, not visible to the naked eye. From these wounds in the tree, there exudes after rain, a clear, slowly running juice, which the Arabs collect generally from the ground, less rarely from the tree itself, and eat it with bread, as if it were honey. " We had the good fortune," says Ehrenberg, in 1823, ''to be the first, after a long succession of 544 A VISIT TO THE EAST. centuries, to explain a circumstance, which had been enveloped in holy mystery, so far as a plain inquiry into nature can solve it." Now, though no one will deny Ehrenberg his title to be considered a trustworthy inquirer into nature, it is quite another question whether he be an equally trustworthy inquirer into holy Scripture. Is the manna of the Bible the same substance as that of which these travellers speak ? The sacred histo- rian (Numbers xi. 8) describes the Israelites to have ground the manna in mills, and to have pounded it in mortars. Seetzen confesses that modem manna admits of neither. The Mosaic history relates that, for the space of forty years, the people were fed with manna daily. The travellers say that manna falls only in June and July, and no where mention that it ceases to fall each Sabbath day. It would be necessary also to the hypothesis of the travellers, that the Israelites should have found groves of tamarisk trees at each of their encamp- ments, and they must then account for the discre* pancy of their own statement, that this tree exists only in a few valleys of the peninsula. And accord- ing to their report of the amount of manna now col- lected, which has never been known to exceed 600 pounds* weight in the best season, this would, on a division, give 555 ooo P^^ ^^ ^ pound for each man's daily consumption. How much out of this, his wife and children could take for their share, it is not easy to say. So much for trustworthy inquirers into nature. I'he manna of these travellers is not the same with the bread from heaven, and the angels' food of the book of Psalms. From the wilderness of Sin they came to Rephi- dim, where Amalek was defeated, and where the people, murmuring for water, received it from the rock. It is hardly possible to look for Rephidim CH. XXIII.] WANDERINQg OF THE ISRAELITES. 345 where the present tradition has placed it, for it is distinctly said that Israel removed from Rephidim, and encamped opposite the mount. The stone in question is not three hundred yards from their en- campment at the foot of the mount. It must there- fore be looked for elsewhere. A probable spot seems to be in the upper part of Wadi Sheick, which is the boundary of the mountain district of Sinai. Burckhardt found here an Arab tradition of Moses, in a spot called Mokad Seidna Mousa. The people now remained many months en- camped before the holy mount, where they received the well-known law, which has given man a know- ledge of sin. The remainder of their sojourn in the wilder- ness will be made more intelligible by dividing it into three parts. I. From Mount Sinai to Kadesh, where they were commanded to ascend the mountain of the Amorites, and to go up and to possess the land; and, on their disobedience, were condemned to wan- der forty years in the wilderness. II. The thirty-eight years of their punishment, during which they wandered in the wilderness, and again visited Kadesh ; which were ended when they came to the brook Zered. III. Journey from the brook Zered, through the land of Moab, to the promised land of Canaan. On the 20th day of the second month, in the second year of their coming out of Egypt, the people moved from Mount Sinai, and continued eleven days on the journey to Kadesh, which lay at the foot of the mountain of the Amorites. Here they must have remained at least forty days, until the return of the spies whom they had sent to obtain intelligence of the land, which brings the time to about the end of the third month of tfie second year. How long they 346 A VISIT TO THE EAST. remained in Kadesh before the messengers were sent, is no where said ; only in a general way (Deut. 1. 46) : '* So ye abode in Kadesh many days." The particular route that the people took, is now a matter of entire uncertainty. Von Raumer inclines to the belief, that they followed the present caravan route from Sinai to Hebron for some distance, until it became necessary to incline to the eastward to« wards Kadesh, *' through the waste and howling wil- derness" which to this day bears the name, £1 Tih Beni Israel, the wandering of the sons of Israel. The routes which Breidenbach, in the year 1483, and Seetzen in the year 1808, took from Hebron to Sinai, in the main agree with that followed by the Israelites, with the above mentioned difference, that the latter part of the Israelite route inclines to the east. From the plain of Gaza to Sinai, Seetzen did not meet with a single village, nothing but bare limestone rocks, plains covered with black volcanic stones, wide patches of drifl sand, here and there a puddle of brackish water, unfit to be drunk. On a low ridge of hills, this traveller saw nothing on all sides but the most frightful wilderness, without either tree, bush, or a single green spot. His own words are, "The range of the El Tih, over which I came, is perhaps the most desert and barren mountain region in the world." Felix Fabri, Breidenbach's com- panion, gives the following account of their journey. " We came into the wilderness, and the further we advanced the wilder it became, until we were come into the true wild wilderness, in which no man has ever dwelt, or any child of man has found an abode. Moreover, we saw no city, no castle, no village, no house, no shepherd's hut, neither ploughed ground nor meadow land, neither wood nor field, neither bush nor tree, neither leaf nor grass, but naked, burnt, black, barren, bleak hills and mountains. There is here CH. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 847 neither flying, running, nor creeping thing. Further on," he adds, "we came into a still wilder wilderness than heretofore, without either path or covering, in which nothing may find life except ostriches, the traces of which we saw in the sand." Such is the wilderness through which Israel jour- neyed from Sinai to Kadesh : " the waste and howling wilderness" (Deut. xxxii. 10). Or as it is described by the prophet Jeremiah (Jer. ii. 6), "Neither said they. Where is the Lord that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilder- ness ; through a land of deserts and of pits ; through a land of drought and the shadow of death ; through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt. And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit thereof, and the goodness thereof: but when ye entered, ye defiled my land, and made mine heritage an abomination." From the time of the command given to them at Kadesh, to take their journey into the wilder- ness (Deut. i. 40) by the way of the Red Sea, to their coming to the brook Zered, is a period of thirty- eight years of punishment (Deut. ii. 18, 14). It was spent chiefly in the great valley of El Ghor and El Arabah, wandering from place to place. They came twice past Mount Hor, and a second time to Kadesh, when the prophetess Miriam died. It was on their second coming to Kadesh that Moses com- mitted the sin for which he was condemned to die before the people passed over Jordan (Deut. xxxii. 51). Hence the place obtained the name Meribah Kadesh, or the Kadesh of strife. On their passing by Mount Hor, Aaron was commanded to go up and die there ; and the people, on being refused a passage through the territory of Edom, went a second time towards Eziongeber and Elath, and came round in the line of the present Hadj route to Damascus, to 348 A VISIT TO THE EAST. the east side of Edom. This line of route leads over a high table-land, 1000 feet above the level of the wilderness of El Tih. On the western side, within the fastnesses of their mountains, Edom might have opposed with confidence the attack of Israel ; but after Israel had gone round the Mount Seir, and ap- proached them from the east, to the weak side of their mountains, their courage fell ; and they sold them food and water in peace (Deut. ii. 28, 29). From thence the people came to the brook Zered. The remainder may be told in the words of Jephtha (Judges xi. 17-23): "Then Israel sent messengers unto the king of Edom, saying, Let me, I pray thee, pass through thy land : but the king of 'Edom would not hearken thereto. And, in like manner, they sent unto the king of M oab ; but he would not consent : so they abode in Kadesh. Then they went along through the wilderness unto the Red Sea, and com- passed the land of Edom, and the land of Moab, and came by the east side of the land of Moab, and pitched on the other side of Amon, but came not within the border of Moab: for Amon was the border of Moab. And Israel sent messengers unto Sihon king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon ; and Israel said unto him, Let us pass, we pray thee, through thy land unto my place. But Sihon trusted not Israel to pass through his coast : but Sihon ga- thered all his people together, and pitched in Jahaz, and fought against Israel. And the Lord God of Israel delivered Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel, and they smote them : so Israel pos- sessed all the land of the Amorites, the inhabitants of that country. And they possessed all the coasts of the Amorites, from Amon even unto Jabbok, and from the wilderness even unto Jordan." As the last act of God's providence to his people before they entered the land of promise, Moses, their CH. XXIII.] WANDERINGS OF THE ISRAELITES. 349 great prophet and lawgiver, was caused to die in sight of the land to which he had now brought them. (Deut. xxxiv. 7) : " He was an hundred and twenty years old when he died : his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated. And the children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days." They then crossed the Jordan by a miracle, as they had before passed through the Red Sea. And now the time has been brought about in the designs of God, when the Gentile is permitted to say, with the great lawgiver and prophet of Israel, " The secret things belong unto the Lord our God; but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law" (Deut. xxix. 29). II H CHAPTER XXIV. CONCLUSION. The reader, who may have kept us company on this journey, will not need to be reminded, that the route he has passed over holds a very peculiar rank among human itineraries. It was the earliest, and for many ages the exclusive, object of interest to all Europe. Princes, wearied with their thrones, betook them- selves hither to escape from their cares ; and in the cottages of their poorest subjects, When haply, too, some pilgrim thither led, With many a tale repaid the nightly bed, his tale was of this land and its wonders. And, as long as the world lasts, there will be an affectionate regard for this land, that will ensure a welcome for any narrative, which shall but speak of its present appearance and condition. The minds of mankind, through successive generations, and in countries dis- severed by position and language from mutual inter- course, are not thus drawn to a remote, distant spot of the earth, without some sufficient reason. The fact is itself at least a presumptive proof, that something mar- vellous is there, or thereabouts, concealed, that would repay investigation. And any inquirer, at a loss to account for the visible perplexities of this state of being, might instinctively suspect, that the key to the whole enigma was here, or hereabouts, to be found. For if there be nothing in this, then what a deceivable creation mankind must be, to have been so many years, and in so many places, misled CH. XXIV.] CONCLUSION. 351 by an error, and occupied with a fable! What a noble triumph of intellect to detect the deception ! How signal an achievement, to set the reason free from the chains of so widely spread a delusion! True. But let me ask, What am / to gain by this triumph of intellect? One practical consequence must inevitably follow, and that is, to dissociate me altogether from this innumerable company of the de- ceived ; for how is an emancipated intellect to find any pleasure in the society of those whom it knows to be led captive by a fable ? And if that be the case, and if I am to renounce my companions because you would persuade me they are mistaken, I would rather have nothing to do with such doctrines ; I would not thank you for them ; I had rather continue to believe even a fable, if it must be so, with my Christian friends, than I would purchase all possible emancipation of mind, at the price you oiFer it me. The very heathen poet's maxim is better than what you would persuade me, Dulce mihi forere est amico. Imagine an emancipated mind in the midst of such a scene as that described by the Scottish poet! Think what must be its reflections ! — ** The cheerful supper done, wi' serious face They round the ingle form a circle wide. The sire turns o'er, with patriarchal grace, The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride : His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside ; His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare. Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, He wales a portion, with judicious care ; And * Let us wonhip God,' he says, with solemn air. The priest- like father reads the sacred page — How Abram was the friend of God on high, Or Moses bade eternal warfeure wage With Amalek's ungracious progeny," &c. Surely there must be real solitude and desolation S52 A VISIT TO THE BAST. of heart, where these things are accounted fables. To any, therefore, who shall attempt to persuade me, that they are so, I have an answer, as follows : ^* Oh, my soul, come not thou into their secret: unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united !" We should attribute an especial honour to this route above all others, had we no other cause for so doing, beside the recollection, that it has been once described by the pen of an inspired historian. But more than this, it has been the scene of a series of very significant judgments visited upon the Israelite people when they passed over it ; and these, to this day, occupy an important post in Chris- tian theology. The mere fact itself, that they were God's judgments, would be enough to draw the atten- tion of every honest-minded Christian to them, in the hope that they might afford some indication of the mind of the Almighty, in His divine judgment of certain actions. No creature can be indifferent to a revelation of the will of the Creator, be it ever so obscure ; and we should therefore have done well, to study deeply the circumstances of the Israelite pas- sage over this route, had the Scriptures of the New Testament no where specially referred us to them. St. Paul, however (1 Cor. x.), has selected five of these judgments for the particular warning of Chris- tians ; and in the epistle to the Hebrews has referred to the fate of the generation which died in this wil- derness, for an example of punishment upon unbe- lief. St. Jude has referred to the same period, and has cautioned against the danger of Korah*s gainsaying: and the great body of Christian theology abounds in references to this period. The early Church, as may be gathered from the writmgs of the fathers, appears to have considered the forty years* wandering of die wilderness emblematic of the general condition of the Catholic Church upon earth, and of CH. XXIV.] CONCLUSION. 35S the trials of Christian life in the individual believer ; interpreting of the Church, the saying of Scripture (Rev. xii. 6) respecting the woman who fled into the wilderness : it being by them held to be the Church militant's portion, to pass over this earth on her way to the heavenly Canaan promised by her Lord, sub- ject to those real dangers and trials, the figures of which happened to the Israelite people on their pas- sage to the land promised by Moses. I am not aware that this view has been formally drawn out by any of the primitive fathers, in a work assign- ing its exact allegorical value to every portion of the history. The notion is rather generally interwoven into their writings, than formally drawn out in any particular one. St. Jerome has, perhaps, done the most, in a treatise upon the forty- two stations of their march, enumerated in the book of Numbers. Now, though a theological disquisition would be here sadly out of place, the reader who has thus far taken an interest in these scenes, will be glad to bid farewell to them, by joining in a parting glance at some points of the emblematic meaning, which the primitive Church has assigned to this portion of Jewish history. " Out of Egypt have I called my son," is the language of prophecy. The passage of the Red Sea delivered the first Israel from their enemies, Pha- raoh and all his host, introducing them to the wil- derness, whither they were sent to sacrifice. The laver of regeneration — Christian baptism — in like manner, calls the Christian from the city which is spiritually called Egypt (Rev. xi. 8), delivers him from the power of his spiritual enemy, and sends him upon his trial into the wilderness of Christian life, in which he is ever accompanied by the pillar of the cloud by day, and of fire by night. Israel now enters upon her series of temptations, falls, reco- H H 2 S54f A VISIT TO THE EAST. veries, and judgments. Murmurings for want of food; succeeded in due time by loathsomeness and nausea for it, after it had been given. Next oc- curs the temptation to secularise the appointed holy days of the Church ; signified by the gathering manna on the Sabbath. The murmuring for water: suc- ceeded by the attack of Amalek, and the victory of the Church through prayer. We have next an instance of human recklessness in the vicinity and presence of God, as exhibited by a people who sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play, after they had seen the terrors of the Almighty displayed on Mount Sinai ; immediately succeeded by one of unbelief, in their betaking themselves to do sacrifice to an idol of their own making, with the full consent of the priesthood, who stand by and assist. The gainsaying of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, is an in- stance of rebellion against the divine authority of the priesthood, and of the vengeance of God upon such sin.^ The lusting after flesh, on the way to Kadesh, from weariness of the manna, **our soul loatheth this light bread,'' explains itself. As the promised land draws nearer, dangers seem to threaten in proportion. The Church is weak, her enemies are mighty : *' we are as grasshoppers in their sight." Here is the Church's trial of courage, whether she have faith in her promise of protection, to go up and possess the land, or whether she fears her adver- saries too much to attack and overcome them: as the individual Christian would say, whether there be faith to fight the good fight, and lay hold on eternal life — to speak boldly against all wicked doers, to root them out, and to possess the land ; or whether it seem better to turn back. A long term of wandering now succeeds, in which the purposes of God against the ^ See a remarkable sermon of Mr. Newman*s upon this sub- ject ; vol. iv. '^ CH. XXIV.] CONCLUSION. 355 unbelieving people, one by one take effect; and during which a new generation arises, who are to enter the promised land. Aaron the high-priest dies ; the haughty dukes of Edom reject the suffer- ing wanderers, and refuse diem a passage. On coming to the plains of Moab, the powers of God are put in requisition to compass the Church's ruin. The prophet is hired to curse, and by a power not his own, his words are changed to a blessing. " There is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel.'' There is but one way for the prophet to injure Israel, — " the doctrine of Ba- laam, who taught Balak to cast a stumbling block before Israel ;" or as we might now say, the teaching of those who make the doctrine of the cross easy and popular. At last, after several victories over ene- mies, the banks of the Jordan come in sight ; one only barrier remains yet to be passed, and the pro- mised land is gained. How stands the parallel? Of the whole Christian fellowship, none of those that pass over return to bring back to their friends on the bank tidings of the Canaan that lies beyond. But to the Jewish people, as they were encamped on the brink of Jordan, three spies brought back tidings of the land. They lay three days in the mountain, and then came and told Joshua, the son of Nun, all things that befel them. There is One, the head of the Church, who after lying three days concealed in the rock of Mount Zion, has brought to the Chris- tian the tidings of the land that is beyond the Jordan, and has given us a hope of one day seeing the great city, the holy Jerusalem, wherein is no temple ; " for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the tem- ple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it ; for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the nations of them which are saved shall walk t** 356 A VISIT TO THE EAST. in the light of it : and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it. And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day ; for there shall be no night there. And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it. And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie ; but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life" (Rev. xxi. 22-27). There is something often startling and painful to myself, in the thoughts with which I look back upon my own journey over this country. I have often formerly been at a loss to understand, how the Jews were able to bear the awful denunciations of their prophets, without amending their ways ; for nothing seems to have been wanting, in their case, to make the warnings effectual. Their prophets did not denounce everlasting woe, as the Christian have since done, from the midst of every snug charm and embellish- ment of this present life : they were the messengers of God to a rebellious people ; and they came to them out of caves and dens, in sheepskins and goatskins, in sackcloth and ashes, and the woe they predicted was legibly written in their own sufferings. Yet, when I come to remember my own feelings on spots visibly marked with the signs of Almighty ven- geance, — the childish curiosity, the heedless frolic, and the jokes, in which we could indulge, on be- holding monuments of the living power of Almighty wrath, — the blindness of the Jews ceases to be a mystery. I clearly see that where God is, there must be the fear of him. It were to have been thought, that a consciousness that we were following the track of a people, who had perished by thou- sands for their acts of rebellion, and that we were living in tents as they had done, contrary to all Eu- ropean habits, — would have suggested thoughts, that CH. XXIV.] CONCLUSION. 357 could not fail to have tamed a societv such as ours, for the short time it was to continue together ; yet seldom was petty dissension so continued and vex- atious. Every object that daily surrounded us was a sermon. The arid parched aspect of the ground ; its pale, sickly herbage ; the almost entire absence of life ; the lurid glare of the rocks ; the desolate withered stillness of the landscape ; the naked bar- renness of all that lay around ; the occasional cir- cular ring of an Arabian encampment, with its dark chequered tents ; the flocks of goats and sheep cover- ing the hill sides like little dots ; the sharp dryness of the air ; the often crisp encrusted ground we were passing over ; above all, the solemn nakedness of the rocks of Mount Sinai, and the city that built her nest with the eagle in the cleft of the rock, in the state in which the hand of Almighty power had left her ; — these were among the many objects which might have tempted a man to say, " Doubtless there is a God that judgeth the earth, into whose hands it must be a fearful thing to fall." Yet it would be wrong to withhold the confession, that though we were precisely forty days save one on the journey from Cairo to Jerusalem, it was never once publicly pro- posed to sanctify the Lord's day by a halt ; and I fear that the day itself, to me, too often passed with very little consciousness of its sacred character, and without any outward observance of it. Under these circumstances, then, it would certainly be unjust to wonder at the blindness of the Jews, who made light of the warnings of their prophets. APPENDIX. A SHORT HISTORY OP THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE, TRANSLATED PROM THE GERMAN OP J. VON HAMMER. The last wave of European invasion into the Holy Land had heen broken by the fall of Acre to- wards the end of the thirteenth century (May 18th, 1291), when ten dynasties arose in Asia Minor from out of the ruins of the empire of the Sara- cens ; the mightiest of these, founded by Osman the Black, and called after his name, soon swal- lowed up the other nine, which, together with itself, had spread themselves over the broken remains of the caliphate. Its seventh chieftain, 150 years afterwards, upheaved the last of the Byzantine em- perors from his throne ; and bearing a title fully war- ranted by the position of his new metropolis, viz. Sultan of two continents, and Chakan of two seas, he advanced to seize both Europe and Asia in his conquering grasp, — an overbearing kingdom, which, throughout two centuries and a half after the taking of Constantinople, continued to be the terror of the whole of Europe, who feared in the Turks the return of the Mongols : a while poised on the zenith of its might, in the reign of Suleiman the Lawgiver, it threat- ened to convert the tower of St. Stephan* into a minaret, and the high school in Vienna into a me- drese, until after the second unsuccessful attempt to ^ The St. StephaQ*s Kirche in Vienna is known for its lofty tower. I I J. YON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 359 subdue Vienna, at the end of the seventeenth cen- tury (the fourth of its own existence), the peace of Carlowitz placed a limit to its extension. Since then, in spite of the peace of Belgrade, which was but a last flickering effort of the dying flame of Osman dominion, it suffered a continual decline till the peace of Kainard, which, recognising as it did the protection of Russia over the church and prin- cipalities of the Greeks, contained the seeds of the Greek revolution, and of the peace of Adrianople, which is but a corollary of that of Kainard. The events that mark the period between the two treaties fall within our own times ; and on that account are beyond the province of a history, which, free from the shackles of present policy, and without either the magnifying or lessening lens of personal partiality, has set before itself, as the end of its narrative, to treat of none but those events which, through open and accessible search into every kind of document, really fall under the province of his- tory — with love and truth, with love for truth, and truth in love for history, and for the East. Since the reforms which were first begun by Sultan Selim, at the end of the last century, and since then continued on a far more sweeping scale by the late Sultan Mahmoud, changes, in part stained with blood, in part peaceable, in part striking at the very root of the empire, and in part merely super- ficial, the Osman empire has been subjected to a process of fermentation, the issue of which is yet to appear. ** This too will pass over," as says the Persian ; and " when that is past which is to pass," as says the Arab, then and not till then will a futiu'e historian be enabled to produce the same faithful historical picture of the last sixty years, as the one which is here given of the preceding five centuries. 360 APPENDIX. In a history of a Moslim empire which first appeared upon the face of the world in the seventh century after the Hedschra, and of a Turkish em- pire which arose four hundred years after the first westward wanderings of the Turcoman tribes from the east (by which the Magyars were driven from their settlement in the tract of country between the Wolga and the Dnieper, into Hungary), it will be superfluous to trace the history from Mohammed, the founder of Islam, and still more so to commence it from Turk, the patriarch of their race, whose memory Herodotus has with more euphony pre- served in the name Targitaus. It may suffice to remark, that Suleiman, tibe grandfather of Osman, of the Turkish tribe of Kai, who, since their emi- gration firom the Chinese firontier (in the middle of the seventh century of the Christian era), had settled around the Backal Sea,^ about Amur and Selenga, made himself master of Turkistan proper, and after- wards extended his dominion as far as Transoxana and Chorasan. Being driven out of this settlement, (the eastern extremity of the Persian empire,) by the conquering Mongols, he was drowned in die Eu- phrates, near the fortress of Dschaaber, on his migra- tion towards Asia Minor; whereupon three of his sons returned to Chorasan: the fourth, Ertoghrul, t. e. the upright man, settled himself in the Alps of Karadschatagh (black mountains), on the western boundary of the district of Angora, in the service of the Saracen emperor Aladdin, where tlie eldest of his three sons, Osman, was born, in the 657th year of the Hedschra, the 1258th of the Christian era, exactly one century after the birth of Dschengischan. Ertoghrul had already dreamed of the future great- ness of his house, while under the roof of some ^ An inland sea east of Turkistan. ^ J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 361 pious saint ; but Osman himself had received a much brighter vision in the house of the holy scheick, Edebali, who had given him a real treasure in his daughter, the beautiful Malchatun, t. e, lady of trea- sure. Osman the Black served as commander on the frontiers, under the emperor, against the inroads of the Tartars at Melangeia (its Turkish name, Karad* scha Hissar, bearing the same meaning as the Greek, viz. the black fort) ; and in the year 1289, 500 years before the French Revolution, he received the whole of the adjoining territory as a feof under the empe- ror, togedier with the insignia of banner, drum and horse-tails. Issuing from the Black Fort and the Old Town (Eskischehr, the Dorylaum of the Crusaders,) Os- man would make incursions, in company with his friend, the Greek renegade, Kose Michal, t. e. Michael with the pointed beard, as far as to the other side of the Sangaris. He conquered Beled- schik (Belokoma), by stratagem ; carried off the ce- lebrated Greek beauty, Nilufer,^ t. e. lotus-blossom, and seized upon the castle of her father, settled himself at Jenischehr (new city), and became the chieflain of Inoni, now one of the seventeen pro- vinces of Asia Minor, which itself is but one of the twenty-five pashalics of the extensive Osman em- pire. The murderer of his uncle, previous to the conquest of Koprihissar (t. e. castle of the bridge), Osman declared himself, in the last year but one of the thirteenth century, an independent sovereign, by the institution of public services of prayer . in his own name, and the nomination of a district judge (marktvogt). Two years later he defeated tlie officer of the Byzantine body-guard ; entered into treaty with the prefect of Ulubad ; conquered the forts of ^ In German, *' banks of the Nile.'' I I 362 APPENDIX. Olympus and Sangaris; and died after a reign of seven and twenty years' duration, on the day on which Brusa surrendered, and a son and successor, Murad, was bom to his own son and successor, Urchan, in the same manner that Urchan had been bom to him, on the day of his own capture of Karadscha Hissar. Urchan, who is indebted to a bird's crop for his name, — for the Turkish word ur has no other meaning but that of the crop of a birdj — is the Numa Pompilius of the Osman empire, as his father Osman had been its Romulus, and became its law- giver, with the assistance of his brother Aladdin, the first grand vizier, t. e. bearer of the burdens of business. After him, and after Urchan's eldest son, Suleiman, who came by his death under the plane tree of the Cid (1358), the four Dschenderelis successively bore this highest office of the empire : an instance of the hereditary transmission of the chief power of the state, which was but once after- wards repeated in the whole course of the Osman history, in the case of the five Koprilis. Urchan conquered Semendra, Ailos, Nicsea and Nicomedia the Bithynian capitals, almost in view of Constan- tinople. Coins were struck in Urchan's name (it is uncertain whether Osman had exercised this sove- reign right of Mahometan power); and to him the army owed its uniform and discipline. The dif- ferent forms of turban became now the principal marks of distinctions between the civil and military classes. But the most remarkable institution of all was that of the Janissary corps, whose bloody end our own times have witnessed. Their origin is thus related in the third book of the History : — The third and most important of Aladdin's mea- sures was the formation of a standing military force. J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 363 a full century before Charles VIL of France, who commonly passes in European histories of the middle ages as the first founder of a standing army, took the hint from the Turks. Ertoghrul and Osman had managed their wars with nothing but Turcoman cavalry, which, known by the name of * Akindschi,' t. e. 'marauders,' marched into action as the re- tainers of their feudal lords whenever occasion re- quired. Urchan at first formed a troop of paid infantry, known by the name ' Jaia,' or ' Piade,' t. e. infantry. This force, becoming insolent from excess of pay, soon increased, by its own licentious behaviour, tbe very disorders it was intended to repress; upon which Urchan summoned his bro^ ther, his grand vizier Aladdin, and his commander in chief Kara (the black) Chalil Tschendereli, to advise with him. The commander in chief, but too well acquainted with the obstinate disposition and insolent temper of the Turcomans, struck out a plan for 'a new force, founded upon a deep knowledge of human nature, and a most heartless policy, viz. that it should consist of none but the children of Chris- tians, compelled to become converts to the faith of Islam. * Conquered people,' said he, * are the slaves of their conquerors, to whom belongs the right over their goods, their wives, and children; and by the compulsory conversion of these last to the fiuth of Islam, and by their enrolment in the service of its wars, their welfare temporal and eter- nal will be promoted.' In accordance with the prophet's words, that every new-bom child brought into the world a native disposition to the faith of Islam; so that by promoting the development of this disposition, in an army composed of the chil- dren of Christians, not only would a zeal be kindled for the religion of Islam among unbelievers, but the new force itself would be richly recruited, not only 364 APPENDIX. from the children of the conquered people, but from those who should be induced to come over from the enemy by the powerful ties of common descent and common denial of their faith, — a hellish plan, to which no other can be compared, for its successful results in favour of the Moslems, and against the Christians,, and which remains without an equal in either ancient or modern times. It is true that the chaliphs surrounded their throne with a body-guard composed of Turcoman slaves, whose fidelity and obedience was secured by an unsparing rate of pay, and by breaking off all connexion with their kin- dred and country. And conquerors by the removal of their troops into other provinces from those in which they were born, and by drawing tighter the reins of military discipline, have succeeded in lulling to sleep or destroying all memory of national exr istence. But this is the only instance in which> together with the ties of country and kindred, those of birth and religion were torn asunder, and nowhere else but among the Turks has the strength of the army taken root in a threefold apostacy, from coun- try, parents, and religion. I'his black scheme was laid by Chalil Tscheur dereli, 'the black,* blacker in devilish intent than the almost contemporary discovery of powder by Schwarz (black) in Europe. The force went by the name of * new,* (Jeni Tscheri, the new troops), and Janissary was a name soon borne on the wings of victory from Asia to Europe. They received their name, together with the distinctive form of their white felt cap, from the dervish Hadschi B^- tasch. Urchan, attended by some of these paid re- negades, visited this dervish to obtain his blessing, together with a standard and name for the force. The holy sheick laid the sleeve of his felt robe upon the head of the man presented to him, in such J. YON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 365 a manner that the sleeve fell down backwards be- hind the man's head, and spoke, ^Let your name be the new troop (Jenitscheri), your countenance white, your arm victorious, your sabre trenchant, your spear piercing; may you ever return home with victory.' In memory of this blessing the white felt cap received an appendage to hang down back- wards, representing the sleeve of the sheick as it had hung down on the occasion ; while in front, instead of a tuft of hair, or other military token, was fixed a wooden spoon. As an auspicious au- gury of the bountiful provision intended for the new force, the names of their officers were borrowed from the various departments of the kitchen. The chief of the chamber, t. e. of the regiment, was called Tschorbadschi, t. e. * the soup-maker ;' the next in rank to him, Adschibaschi, t. e. ' the chief cook ;' and Sakabaschi * the water-carrier.' The half moon and the two-edged sword of Omar shone conspicuous on their blood red banner. The pal- ladium of the regiment was the ' flesh-pot,' around which they assembled, not merely to eat, but for councils of war. These forms were still in ex- istence after a period of more than five hundred years, when Sultan Mahmud II. (16th June 18£6) destroyed the whole force. Under Mohammed II. these pillars of the Ottoman empire, like every other part of it, were enlarged and strengthened, and both the pay and the number of the *new troops' in- creased. This was fixed at first at an ' asper,' be- low which sum it never sank, although it increased afterwards to seven times that amount The asper was the original amount of pay, and a thousand the original number of the Janissaries. Each suc- cessive year an additional thousand Christian child- ren were forced into the service from the prisoners taken in the wars of Islam ; and when the number I I % of prisoners was not enough, the defective numbers, or in peace tlie whole amount, was supplied from the children of the Chtistiaii subjects, until the reign of Mohammed IV., when the foice b^an to decline in consequence of the admission of their own chil- dren as recruits. Tc^ther with them, tlie Sipahi (horsemen), the Silihdare (bearers of weapons), the Ulufedschi (attsr^ cenaries), the Cliureba (strangers), were dividetl into four companies, to serve as a mounted body-guard for the sovereign, and in consequence to protect the sacred banner (die eagle standard of the prophet) on all military expeditions. The sipahi were invest- ed with greater and lesser feofs (Siamet and Timar). The foot soldiery consisted pardy of jaia (foot sol- J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 367 diers), who in after times, together with part of the cavalry force, obtained the name of M usulmen (free from taxes) ; partly of infantry, who were the Asab (or bachelors). The horse soldiery who served on marauding expeditions were called Akindschi, the so called sacheggiatori of the Italians, who, known by the German name Sackman, derived from the Italian word, were the terror of Austria and Hungary for three centuries. Urchan founded the first high school of the empire at Nice, in the church once so famous in church history for the oecumenical synod held in it, but now changed into a mosque. Cells and retreats of dervishes and Abdalis (santons) be- gan now to spring up at die foot of Mount Olympus ; on the top of which were formerly the cells of Christian monks, after whom the mountain had been named Monks' hill. Brusa, which lay at the foot of Mount Olympus, so called in ancient history after Prusias, the oldest of the Bithynian kings, one of the best situated and best watered inland towns of the world, the capital city of the empire until the conquest of Constantinople, and the burial- place of the sultans, celebrated for the healing power of its warm baths, the purity of its springs, and its natural and scientific productions, was likewise the favourite residence of learned men and poets; of whom the first Ottoman romance writer, Scheichi, indited his poem of Chosrew and Schiri, in the midst of rippling springs and waving pine forests. Round the mausolea of the first six sultans are grouped half a thousand tombs of renowned viziers, pashas, sheicks, muderris, orators, doctors, poets, and musicians. After the Turks had crossed the Hellespont nine- teen times in the course of one century, since the year 1263, Suleiman Pasha, Urchan's son and vi- zier, resolved one fine moonlight night, at the ruins 368 APPENDIX. of Cyzicum, upon a twentieth attempt ; his boldness obtained success : an earthquake, from the effects of which the walls of Callipolis a short time before had suffered great damage, threw the city open to the Turks and several others, who came in from the surrounding country. A fall from his horse de^ prived Suleiman Pasha of his life, and the succes- sion to the throne, which now devolved upon his brother Murad, whose title of honour was Ghasi, < . e, champion in the holy war, and Chud&wendkiar, or lord; which latter was afterwards shortened into Chunkiar, equivalent to Sultan, the title oi the Ot- toman rulers. Neither Osman, Urchan, or Murad, however, bore the title of sultan ; Bajezid, the fourth sovereign, was the first who obtained it by a di- ploma from the titular caliph of the house of Abbas in Cairo, whom, since the conquest of Bagdad by the Mongols and the fall of the caliphate, the sultans of the Egyptian Mamlukes maintained merely as a titular representative of God upon earth, in order to gain from him a legitimate title to their own domi- nion. Murad, the " champion of the &ith," " the lord,'' put an end to the disturbances in Asia MiiKMr by the conquest of Angora, and established himself in Europe by the seizure of Adrianople ; he subdued, in a pitched battle at Marizza, the power of the Ser- vians, a memorial of which still survives in the mi- raculously gifted image of Maria Zell, presented by Louis king of Hungary, in gratitude for his pre- servation from the Turks ; Lower and Upper Mysia,. i. e. Bulgaria and Servia, were subdued by him, and a peace concluded with them : Nissa and Sofia were taken. In Asia, Murad made an alliance with tlie chieftain of Kermian, by the marriage of his own son with the chieftain's daughter ; he subdued Kara- mania, the most powerful of the dynasties, which had shot up like mushrooms out of the ruins of the Sara- J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 369 cen empire ; gained six cities by purchase from the province of Hamid ; made himself master of Para- wadi, Schumna, Tirnova, and Hirschova; overthrew on the plain of Kossova the united Bulgarian and Servian armies, but lost both his life and the fruit of his victory by assassination at the hand of the Servian Milosch Kobilovich. His successor, Bajezid Ilderim, i, e. the lightning- flash, secured himself on the throne by the murder of his brothers, a practice which, in the reign of Mohammed II. grew into a law of the empire, and raged as a principle of bloodshed through four cen- turies. After he had concluded peace with the king of Servia, and the Greek emperor, he soon broke the latter, and laid seige to Constantinople. The em- peror John, who, at the command of Bajezid, had, together with his son, ascended the walls of his own city Philadelphia, in order to lay them at the feet of the sultan, began to think, when it was too late, about the defence of his capital, and for this purpose pulled down three of the finest churches to build towers for the protection of the golden gate, which are now the two largest of the well known seven towers. The siege was raised in consideration of the admission of a kadi to reside in Constantinople. In Asia the province of Karaman, i. e. Sebaste and Cesarea, together with the territory of Kastemuni, Dschanik, and Amasia, were gained by conquest ; and the city of Sinope alone left in the hands of the son of the house of Isfemliar. To lessen the increasing bribery on the part of the officers of justice, who up to this time had exercised their functions with- out settled fees, special rates were fixed. A mosque was built at Brusa ; and on the Asiatic coast of the Bosphorus, Giiseldschehissar, or the pleasant castle, was erected as an earnest of the conquest of Con- stantinople. The allied army of Sigismund was der 370 APPENDIX. feated at Nicopolis, and the victory sealed by the murder of 10,000 prisoners. The Turkish com- mander Timurtasch commenced the conquest of Greece with the capture of Athens. Bajezid was drawn off fVom the second siege of Constantinople by Timur the Lame, in fighting against whom, in the battle of Angora, he lost both throne and liberty. After Bajezid's death his sons quarrelled for the empire both in Asia and Europe; they bore the names of four great prophets, Isa (Jesus), Musa (Moses), Suleiman (Solomon), and Mohammed. The spirit of Islam seemed to foretell victory to the lat- ter, who bore the same name with the last, in the eyes of Musulmen the greatest of the prophets, and their fond prophecy was fulfilled. After Isa had been slain at Ulubad by Mohammed, and his head sent to his brother Suleiman ; after Musa, who had seized the Asiatic empire, had conquered his bro- ther Suleiman in Europe, beseiged Constantinople, and twice defeated Mohammed, but, being betrayed by his officers, was found dead in a ditch ; after Su- leiman who had delivered up his brother and sister to the Greek emperor, and had indulged in great ex- cesses at Ephesus, Brusa, and Angora, had been mur- dered in a bath at Adrianople; — Mohammed, the first of this name, ascends the throne, with the sur- name Kiirischdschi (wrestler), or Tschelebi (the no- ble young lord,) praised for his noble qualities not only by Turkish but also by Greek historians. The peace with Venice was renewed after the sea-fight of Callipolis, and a truce granted to the prince of Moldavia in consideration of a tribute, and to the chieftain of the house of Isfendiar, in return for the mines of Kastemuni. Dschuneid, the powerftil pirate in Aidin, Borkledsche Mustafa, the dangerous revo- lutionist, at the head of his fanatic dervishes, and another counterfeit Mustafa, were defeated. Mo^ J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 371 haipmed paid a visit at Constantinople to the Greek emperor Manuel, the keeper of his brother and sis- ter. The concealment of his death, until his suc- cessor was in possession of the empire, was the first example in Turkish history of a piece of policy on the part of despotic power, subsequently very often repeated. Under Murad II. the Ottoman army made its fourth appearance before the walls of Constantino- ple. He then renewed peace with Servia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Wallachia, and Byzantium, although not with Venice ; conquered Thessalonica ; peopled Jenidsche Wardar with a colony of Turks, in the same manner in which Mohammed I. had removed a number of Tartars into the country of Philippo- polis ; he defeated his brother in law, the chieftain of Karaman, twice, and granted him peace at the instance of his sister ; he abdicated the throne at forty years of age, in order to enjoy philosophic ease at Magnesia, and, on being called again to it by a breach of the peace on the part of Hungary, he chastised them in the battle of Varna ; then a second time abdicated the throne; and ascended it for the third time as conqueror of Corinth. Under him Ottoman literature first gave birth to the writ- ings of several learned lawyers and poets, which have maintained themselves among the people up to this day. Bom in 1431, the year of the great plague, Mo- bammed ascended the throne at twenty one years of age, which he occupied as a conqueror for thirty years ; conqueror of two empires, fourteen kingdoms, and two hundred cities, the noblest of which was the capture of Constantinople, in which Mohammed at last succeeded, when he had contrived to carry a fleet of galleys and boats, seventy sail strong, upon a planked road from Beschiktasch, on the banks of S72 APPENDIX. the Bosphorus, where they were anchored, overland into the harhour of Constantinople ; where at sun- rise they were surveyed in utter astonishment by the besieged, who could scarcely trust their own eyes. Among the fourteen conquered kingdoms, Lesbos and Negroponte are to be counted, the conquest of which appears to have gained less glory for their conqueror than the fruitlessly attempted siege of Rhodes gained for its defenders. Mohammed II. was not only a conquerer, but also a legislator ; he ratified the bloody canon for the murder of those next in suc- cession, became the endower of high schools, the changer- of churches into mosques, the founder of buildings and state institutions, die friend of sciences, and the patron of the learned. The rule for murdering the brothers next in succession, which could not be carried into execu- tion by Bajezid II. the successor of Mohammed II. against his spirited brother Dschem, through the.hands of the executioner, because Dschem disputed the throne by force of arms, was nevertheless put in force at the last by assassination, through the con- nivance of Alexai^er Borgia, after Dschem had been many years a wanderer and a prisoner in France and Italy. Although in his reign Modon and Koron were taken from the Venetians, and the Turkish forces marched over parts of Hungary, Poland, and Aus- tria, Bajezid II. was more inclined to a mystical and contemplative than to an active life. The army fell away from him to his son Selim II. who now de- throned his father ; a warlike tyrant, whose cruelty was not at all softened by his taste for poetry, in which branch of literature he has written more than any other of the Ottoman sultans. The first step he took was, to root out his brothers and cousins with the sword, and afler them the Schii or dissenters of Islam, throughout the whole of his dominions ; J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. S7S victorious over Schach Ismai], the first of the Per- sian dynasty of the Ssofi, and over Sultan Ghawri, the last of the Mamluke sultans, he seized part of the Persian territory, and made himself master of Egypt — victorious over Ishmail at Ischaldiran, and over Ghawri at Merdsch Dahik; he left the Per- sian historian, Idris, in Kurdistan, to reduce it to order, and returned out of Egypt hack to Con- stantinople, with the holy standard of the prophet, and the title of " servant of the two holy cities." Mecca (the city of honour), Medina (the enlightened^ Kairo (the chosen of time), Jerusalem (the holy), together with Damascus fragrant as Paradise, and Aleppo the spotted city, now adorned the imperial diadem of the Ottoman empire, as the next chief cities of the empire, after the three capitals, Brusa, Adrianople, and Constantinople. Selim's cruelty was not much lessened by the interference of his viziers, who were in continual fear for their own heads ; but the humane and upright conduct of the mild and tolerant Mufti Dschemaleddin had a very beneficial influence upon his reign. The greatest of the Ottoman emperors is Sulei- man the Lawgiver, the tenth in succession ; in whose greatness as conqueror, lawgiver, founder of excel- lent institutions to promote piety and learning, the current eastern belief in the excellence of ten as the perfect number obtained a complete fulfilment. After he had subdued the revolt of the Chasali in Syria, conquered Belgrade and Rhodes, entered Ofen in triumph after the battle of Mohacs, appeared as besi^er before the walls of Vienna, bis favour- ite Ibrahym the Greek, having been for thirteen years in the enjoyment of the most unlimited confi- dence and the fullest plenitude of power, became so ungovernably ambitious, that, not content with the title he had asked, and which the delegate had con- K K 374 APPENDIX. ceded, viz. brother of King Ferdinand I., he aspired to that of Sultan, and at last fell the victim of his ingratitude. Suleiman, master of Belgrade (the house of the sacred war), was master also of Bag^ dad (the house of healing, the bulwark of saints), but Giins and Gratz had not opened their gates to him. In the first he left the bold Jurischitz, whose renegade brother was Suleiman's lieutenant at Urfa, and at Gratz he forded the Mur. His seventh ex- pedition gained him the island of Corfu and the other islands of the Archipelago ; his brother in law, the learned grand vizier Lutfipascha, commanded the army which attacked Corfu, and Chaireddin the ce- lebrated pirate commanded the fleet in the Archi- pelago ; his ships defeated those of the Portuguese in the Arabian gulf. The eighth campaign gained Moldavia; the ninth, Hungary, after Zapolya's death, when he made himself master of Ofen. In the tenth campaign Sabacz, Fiinf kirchen, and Gran were conquered, llie eleventh was the second Persian campaign, during which, misled by a weak attach- ment to the ambitious Pole or Russian Roxelana, he sacrificed his own son Mustafa to the step- mother, and out of fondness for her, stained his hands in the blood of his son and grandson. His last and thirteenth campaign was against Szigeth, a name which will always live in history, in conse- quence of Suleiman's death before its walls, and Zrinyi's heroic courage in its defence ; just as Su- leiman himself will be ever remembered for his con- quests, laws, buildings, and institutions, for his pa- tronage of science and poetry, which under his reign reached the highest state of perfection. On the same day that Suleiman was celebrating the marriage of his favourite Ibrahim with one of the ladies of the harem (23d May, 1524), Roxelana gave birth to her son Selim; and as thirty years J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 375 elapsed after this event before she prevailed witli Suleiman, who was now growing old, to consent to the death of Mustafa, she must have been past fifty, and by no means in the bloom of youth and beauty. Selim II. was a drunkard, under whose eight years' reign the empire was maintained at the same height of power and fame to which it had been raised under Suleiman, by the grand vizier Moham- med SokoUi, and the grand mufti Ebusund, who continued at their posts throughout the whole reign. The Portuguese Jew, Don Joseph Nassy, side by side with these two great statesmen, acted the part of the Rothschild of his day, as duke of Naxos. The Emperor Maximilian II. gave Von Minkwiz, the bearer of the Austrian yearly present, a letter of introduction to him, in consideration of his having had the influence at some banquet, where the wine of Cyprus flowed in abundance, to spur on the sul- tan to render himself master of the native country of this noblest of wines. The subjection of Arabia, that had been begun under his grandfather Selim I. was happily now terminated by Selim H The war of Cyprus was made doubly disgraceful by the se- cret motive of the drunkard sultan, and by the fetwa of the mufti and his openly avowed principle, that where the interests of Islam required it, the faithful were not to keep their word with unbelievers, as also by the inhuman flaying alive of one Bragadino. Retribution, however, quickly followed in the battle of Lepanto, the hero of which was Don Juan of Austria. The sea fight of Lepanto is a signal in the his- tory of the Ottoman empire for a period of decline, commencing under Murad III. Alternately under the control of the ladies of his father's and grand- father's harem, and of his instructors, the imam and sheicks, he seemed to waver between the extremes S76 APPENDIX. of asceticism and indulgence ; in virtue of the first, author of a disciplinatory treatise upon &sting ; in virtue of the latter, father of twenty seven daughters ^and twenty sons, nineteen of whom were strangled when his successor Mohammed III. came to the throne. This prince was bom during the campaign of Szigeth, and under him the sacred standard was carried before Erlau, the conquest of which forms the zenith of his reign ; the battle field of Kereztes, however, was the root whence sprung the bloody harvest of Asiatic rebellion. By the imprudent measures of the grand vizier Cicala the Neapolitan renegade, the stragglers who were deprived of their pay ravaged as Dschelali, t. e. rebels, the whole of Asia Minor. In the Hungarian campaign which followed, the gates of Raab were sprung open with petards, by a device of Schwarzenberg and Palfy ; Warasdin and Olen were fruitlessly besieged ; Papa was taken by Ibrahim the Sclavonian, Qie second grand vizier of that name, through the treachery of the Wallonian murderer Kanischa, in spite of the force which hastened to its relief under the duke of Lorraine and Mercoeur, and was subsequently successfully defended by Hassan the Teriakessar with equal science and boldness, against an imperial force that laid siege to it. The Sultaness Valida, the Venetian Lady Bafib, builder of a mosque bear- ing her name, was supreme in the harem ; notwith- standing which, the Jewess Kira, the governess of the harem, was obliged to be given up to the discontented Sipahi. The two great historians of the Turkish empire, Seadeddin and Aali, together with the great lyric poet of this period Baki, died in the last year of the sixteenth century. Ahmed, the successor of Mohammed III., came to the throne at fourteen years of age, and within ten months after the beginning of his reign was J. VON JEIAMM£R*S TURKISH HISTORY. 377 gratified by the birth of two princes, the first of whom was the afterwards so unfortunate Osman. In place of the celebrated rebel, the black Scribe, and his brother Husein the Insane, there rose up four other rebels in Asia Minor. The fourteen years' war with Hungary was at length concluded by the peace of Sivatorok (11 Nov. 1606), after several fruitless attempts made at different times, during seven years, to bring about an agreement. By this peace the disgrace of the Hungarian yearly tribute was for ever removed, and a diplomatic intercourse established for the first time on a footing of equality. Murad Pasha, who had received full power to con- clude peace on the part of the Turks, obtained the surname of Digger of Wells, in his campaign against the rebels of Asia Minor, from his having caused wells to be dug, in order to fill them with mur- dered prisoners. Of the principal rebels, Kalen- der(^li was banished ; Dschanbulad (soul of steel), pardoned; Mosellitschauch, together with Jusuf Pasha, "put out of the way."^ Ahmed did more than any of his predecessors for the beautifying of the holy house of the Kaaba, by rich presents of silver pillars and golden spouts for the roof. In the large mosque built by him near the Hippodrome, the birth day feast of the prophet is stilly early cele* brated. Ahmed was fond of pomp and expense. In the same year (1612), in which were celebrated the two marriages, of Louis XIII. with Anne of Austria, and of Prince Philip of Spain with Elizabeth Bourbon, the weddings of two sultanesses, and the espousals of two others, were conducted with due festivities at Constantinople. A force of Florentines bad, it is true, made a descent at Agaliman, and Cossacks had landed at Sinope ; but peace had been ^ A Turkish euphemism. K K 2 378 APFBNDIX. concluded with Persia, and that of Sivatorok re- newed at Vienna. Baron Czernin entered with flying colours into Constantinople as imperial am- bassador. Two fresh-baked {neugebackenen) minis- ters now conducted affairs at Constantinople and Vi- enna, Ahmed Eckmekdschi, i. e. the baker, and Car- dinal Clesed, a baker's son. Ahmed, the fourteenth of the Ottoman sultans, after a reign of fourteen years, which he began at fourteen years of age, died, and left behind him nine sons, four of whom were by the Sultaness Kosem Mahpeikar, t. e. moon-faced sheep, the most beloved of his wives ; but, accord- ing to the law of Ottoman succession, which calls the oldest of the family to the throne, Ahmed's brother the idiot Mustafa was taken out of the lat- ticed chamber, where he had endured a confinement of fourteen years, and was placed upon the throne. He was not, however, tolerated there longer than three months in consequence of his imbecility. In his room the hopeful Osman came to the dirone. The unsuccessful campaign against Poland, and still more the wide spread report, that the sultan intended a pilgrimage to Mekka, and a reform of the Janis- saries, fanned the smouldering flame of disocmtent among the troops into so full a blaze, that Sultan Osman fell victim to it, being shamefully strangled by them in one of the seven towers. The idiot Mus- tafa, who had before been trailed out of prison to the throne, was again endured for thirteen months instead of three, and then a second time thrown back into prison by the enraged ulemas and troops, and Murad at the age of eleven placed upon the throne. In spite of the decline of the power of the empire, weakened by these rebellions, literature abounded in learned historians, poets, lawyers, and encyclopae- dian writers. Murad IV. a bloody but powerful ruler, not J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 379 only held down the rising hydra- head of rebel- lion with the strong hand of power, but made some successful movements in the East, with the intent to reunite to his kingdom Bagdad and the Persian territories, that had been lost during the weak govern- ment of his predecessors. By Ottoman historians the name of Conqueror is exclusively assigned to the victor of Constantinople. Suleiman, the next after him in greatness, is distinguished as the Lawgiver ; neither Selim I. the conqueror of Egypt and. the Hedschra, or Selim II. the conqueror of Cjrprus and Yemen, are honoured with the title of Conquerors. Mohammed III. and Murad IV. alone are so called, with the specification of their greatest victories, the one as conqueror of Erlau, die other of Bagdad, although this latter place was first conquered by Suleiman, and Murad did but re-conquer it. Mu- rad, who took great delight in the accoutrements of old Persian warriors, on his return from Bagdad made a triumphal entry into Constantinople in a full suit of their armour, and may with great truth be styled the Pehliwan, or strong hero. Of un- daunted courage and great bodily strength, he was victorious in wrestling-matches, and in the field of battle, and was withal a bloody tyrant like Selim I., as well as, towards the end of his life, a drunkard like Selim II., uniting the cruelty of the one to the debauchery of the other. The beginning of his reign had given rise to very different expectations, and had entitled the rebels, together with his mother Kosem, to look forward to being able to influence him throughout his life ; but in the tenth year of his reign and the twentieth of his age, after he had been obliged to sacrifice more than one vizier and favourite to the rebels, and even, at their instance, to march his bro- thers in procession, and himself to make a public treaty with them, — on the 29th May 1 63^, the anni- 380 APPENDIX. * versary of the taking of Constantinople^ he resolved^ once for all, upon becoming sovereign in his own right: he cleared the capital of the heads of the rebels, raged against coffee and smoking houses, stabbed coffee-drinkers with his own hand, marked each station of his march to Erserum with execu- tions, gave from Eriwan, which place he seized upon, the bloody order for putting to death his brothers, although they had hitherto, through the in- fluence of their mother, been spared, notwithstand- ing the law of the empire that required their murder, and thus returned in triumph to Constantinople. On the second Persian campaign, which terminated hap- pily in the conquest of Bagdad, he marked every footstep of his march with blood, and gave proofs of his giant strength and inhumanity : he dashed in pieces the gate of a fortress, broke a shield co- vered with rhinoceros hide by a blow of his mace, and thrust through and through with his staff a wild mountain goat after it had been hunted down. The conquest of Bagdad was sealed with the blood of 30,000 murdered Persians. A bloody tyrant, like Selim I., he was like him a poet idso^ and interchanged a poetical epistle with his trusty vi- zier Hafis Pasha, his general in the first Persian war; and even wrote with his own hand several verses on the window of a monastery, during his second expedition against Eriwan. Towards the end of a life materially shortened by his debauchery, he was tormented with an insatiable thirst for wine, gold and blood, and again succeeded in setting his empire *in an uproar. His favourite maxim, ** Re- venge never grows old, though it may grow grey,*' best describes the bloody tyrant. Ibrahim, successor to Murad IV., is the Sarda- napalus of Turkish history, under whom female rule completely obtained the upper hand. His effemi- J. YON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 381 nacy, his fondness for women, scents, furs and flowers, games and clothes, rarities and curiosities, exceeds all that history has related of weaklings and voluptuaries upon the throne, either before or after him. The loss of a ship, seized by the Ve- netians, on board of which were several eunuchs, caused the Cretan war, in which the whole island, including Candia, was conquered ; and yet Ibrahim caused the spirited conqueror of Canea, as also the grand vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha, by whose power- Ail mind alone order had been maintained in the em- pire, to be put to death. This latter, by the build- ing of cities (Neustadt near Siwas), of bridges (the Musaloghlis, at Adrianople), of baths and schools at Erlau, of medreses and fountains at Constantinople, has left behind a more lasting memorial, than did forty years afterwards his namesake Kara Mustafa Pasha, the second besieger of Vienna. Ibrahim broke through the imperial rule respecting the rank of the chief judge, in favour of his worthless favour- ite Dschindschi Chodscha ; put the offices of vizier and viceroy to sale ; gave away provinces to ladies in the harem for pin money ; and so disgraced the throne by his incapacity and debauchery that his mother Kosem was unable any longer to maintain him upon it, and was constrained to surrender him to the fury of the soldiers and ulemas, by whom he was dethroned, imprisoned, and, after ten days, put to death. Kosem, the old dowager (walida), grandmother of Mohammed IV., and Tarchan the young dowager his mother, each aspired to rule in the name of the minor who was but seven years old. The former was able for three years to maintain her supremacy in the harem, but during these three years a revolt was being matured throughout the empire. In Constantinople the pages, the merchants, and the lawyers, the agas of the Janissaries and the 382 APPENDIX. Sipahi, rose in favour of the young dowager, the eunuchs in favour of the old, who at last was stran- gled by the opposite party* She was the greatest female character of all who figure in Ottoman history, the contemporary of seven sultans, under four of whom (Ahmed, Murad, Ibrahim, and Mohammed) she lived for thirty years, as wife, mother, and grandmother, not merely as chief of the harem, but as possessed of great influence in the council. For years the empire was now a prey to rebels both in the metropolis and in the provinces ; and amongst them Ipschirpasha himself, through agitation, obtained the post of grand vizier. The most famous of these commotions, that of the Janissaries at the Hippo- drome, known by the name of the ^* revolt of the maple-tree," has been expiated in our own days by the last death-rattle of the Janissaries, on the self- same place near the maple-tree. The fleets were now defeated by the Venetians, Lesbos and Lemnos taken by them, when the aged Koprili, the grand vizier, came forward with an iron hand to suppress the rebellion; re-conquered Lesbos and Lemnos, fortified the Dardanelles with new forts, and died, leaving to his son Ahmed, who succeeded him as grand vizier, a kingdom which had been kept together for seven years by dint of blood- shedding. This latter ruled the empire during fifteen years with equal wisdom and power. Victorious at Neuhausel, although defeated in the battle of St. Gothard, the result of which was the peace of Was- war; conqueror of Candia and Camieniec, while the sultan was busy with nothing but hunting and the murder of his brothers, Ahmed Koprili was a great patron of the sciences and learned men, a line which he himself had for some time pursued, ex- changing it subsequently for the life of a statesman. He was the greatest grand vizier of the Ottoman J. YON HAMM£R*S TURKISH HISTORY. 383 empire. His successor in his high office, Kara Mustafa Pasha, expecting to surpass him, by the conquest of Vienna, on being driven back by Sobi- esky and Charles of Lorraine, was executed at Belgrade. Mohammed IV. after a very disturbed reign of forty years, although, thanks to the exertions of the twoKoprilis, not a dishonourable one, was de- throned and cast into the palace dungeon. The welfare of the empire appears to have moved in inverse proportion to the increasing number of its sultans. From having been at the zenith of its conquering success under Mohammed II. it began to decline under Mohammed III. ; at the height of its power under Suleiman I. it sank gradually deeper under Suleiman II., who was the successor of Ma- hommed IV., and not the Suleiman the Lawgiver, to whom European historians, particularly the French, have so long erroneously given the title of Second instead of First,- while Turkish historians never reckoned the pretender Suleiman son of Bajezid I. among the lawful sultans. The short reign (6ve years) of Suleiman II., is rendered remarkable by two notable events. The first, the Congress that assembled to treat of peace, in the house of Con- gress in Vienna, where two Turkish plenipotentiaries were met together, with the Imperial, the Venetian, and the Polish ministers. One of these was the learned Mavrocordato, a chief prop of Turkish policy, his colleague's name was Sulfikar Effendi. The second event was the introduction of the first Nisami Dschedid, t. e. the new order of things, a measure of state reform, for the removal of abuses in tlie finance, and to lessen the oppression of Christian subjects, its chief promoter being the grand vizier Koprili, the third of that name, sumamed Fasil, t. e. the virtuous, a title which he amply deserved, by sealing a virtuous life with a martyr's death, in the 384 APPENDIX. batUe of Slankame, the issue of which proved so disastrous to the Turks. There is little more to relate of the four years' reign of Ahmed II. than of the five years' reign of Suleiman II. He was as much inferior to Ahmed I. as Suleiman was to his predecessor the Lawgiver. Mustafa II., his suc- cessor, is the only instance of a ruler of more note than the first of his name, the idiot Mustafa, inasmuch as in his reign, by the peace of Carlowitz, in which Russia for the first time took part as a contractii^ power, together with Austria, Poland, and Venice, while England and France stood as mediators be- tween the contending powers and the Porte ; a boun- dary was fixed for ever to the conquests of the Turk- ish empire. Mustafa II., successor of Ahmed II., is the second sultan (the idiot Mustafa was the first example of the kind) who after having been raised to the throne by one popular commotion, was de- throned by another, a circumstance which up to the present day has happened but once subsequently, in the case of the unhappy Mustafa IV., who for a ^ort time was the sport of a twofold revolutionary change. The twenty seven years' reign of Ahmed III. is scarcely one of the most uninteresting, although cer- tainly not one of the most glorious ; since in spite of the reconquest of the Morea from the Venetians, after the loss of the battles of Peterwardein and Belgrade, against Eugene, and in spite of the peace of Pruth so disgraceful to Russia, the limits of the empire towards Austria were nevertheless greatly narrowed by the peace of Passarowitz, the last of aU the advantageous treaties made by the Porte. Under the fourteen grand viziers which this reign contains, the two Koprilis shine forth, distinguished rather by the family renown of their name Aan fi>r any exploits of their own. The last and the most remarkable of them is Ibrahim, who filled the office J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 385 during the last twelve years, and who was assas- sinated in the disturbance that ejected the sultan from his throne. As the first grand vizier of this name, who was a Greek, and the second, who was a Sclavonian, so this latter one, an Armenian by birth, was a great patron of architecture and science. Dip- lomatic relations with Europe became now each year more reduced to rule, and more influential over the fate of the Ottoman empire. The Turkish am- bassador to the French court had brought back from thence the art of printing ; and many valuable works in lexicography, geography and history, issued from the press at Constantinople. Mahmud I.*s reign of twenty four years, like the seven and twenty years' reign of his ancestor Ahmed T., was by no means without its share of renown. By the peace of Belgrade the frontiers were again ad- vanced as far as the Sava ; and the Persian troubles, which had already been used by Ahmed III. with the consent of Russia, for the extension of the em- pire towards the East, offered a still greater pro- spect, that was however soon destroyed by the vic- tories of Nadir Schah. The grand vizier, Topal Osman, t. e. Osman the Lame, raised the siege of Bagdad and drove away the Persian pretender from the city of health ; but was himself soon afler slain in the battle of Kerkuk. Under Mahmud I. arose Abdul Wahab, as reformer of Islam, one who aimed at recovering the original purity of the prophet's doctrine. His marauding attacks upon the holy cities of Mekka and Medina are a parallel to those of the Karmatites, which threatened to become more dan- gerous to the empire than, owing to want of skill in their leaders, they had hitherto been. Of the six grand viziers, who lived during the three years' reign of Osman III., the first and the last are more worthy of note than almost any of the couple of hundred grand L L 386 APPENDIX. viziers which the Turkish empire numbers upon its list up to the present day. The first of these, Hekim Sade, t. e. the doctor's son, Alipasha, filled this office for the third time, after having, as general in the Persian war, defeated the Persians thr#e times ; re- duced Urnica and Telris, built mosques there and at Constantinople, and after having been a patron to men of learning, among whom his father, the learned Nuh Effendi, is to be included, who was a translator of many Arabian works into the Turkish language. Under the reign of Mahmud, as well as under that of Ahmed III., libraries had been founded by both sultans, and after their example by the viziers. One of the richest of these is that of the last vizier of Osman III., the learned Raghib, the last celebrated grand vizier of the Turkish empire. The successor of Osman III. Mustafa III. fully established the inauspicious cha- racter which, in former times of Turkish history, had attached itself to the name. After eight of this name, either princes or pretenders to the throne, had been put to death, the idiot, Mustafa I., ascended the throne twice, from whence his imbecility caused him to be twice cast into prison. Under Mustafa II. who escaped from the battle of Zenta, the decline of the empire began, with the peace of Carlowitz; and under Mustafa III. at the peace of Kainard, began the system of diplomatic interference under Russian protection. Mustafa IV. the successor of Selim III. was raised to the throne by a popular tumult, and a few months afterward was dethroned by another similar one, to make room for the now reigning sultan, Mahmud II., thereby completii^ the dozen of unfortunate Mustafiis in Turkish history. The consequences of the peace of Kainard have already been predicted with great clearness and precision by Baron Thugut the Austrian minister, in his report. Turkish history properly concludes with this peace. J. VON hammer's TURKISH HISTORY. 387 The next book will contain the events of the last quarter of the past century, viz. from the peace of Kainard to that of Sistow, together with the reforms of Sultan Selim III. ; the next, the twofold disorder of the succession, and the reforms of sultan (Mahmud II.), the most important of which are contained in the appendix to the tenth volume of the history. But since that time several other changes have taken place, some perhaps rather nominal than real, such as the change of the ancient venerable title belonging to the secretary of state, Reisul Kuttab (head of the se- cretaries), into " Superintendent of foreign affairs ;** and the not less honourable title that anciently be- longed to the minister of the interior, Kiaia anciently Ketchoda, t. e. lord of the house, into '* Superintendent of the affairs of the empire," without however there- by altering the nature of their duties. The name of vizier, i. e. bearer of the burden of public business, might with much more reason have been abolished, since the vizier does now no longer direct the business of the empire with full powers, and seems to possess a mere dignity rather than an actual office, so many overlookers, such as the seraskier pasha and the Mudir, i. e, " busybodies,** having intruded them- selves into a share of his duties. 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